Extra Elite 100 Player Rankings close April 29 at 5pm MST
Days
Hours
Minutes
Seconds
Nominations are now open!

SEC commit Maddie Gallagher: Why a New Yorker Plays on a Florida Club Team

Maddie doesn’t mind the six hours of travel to be with her Mustang teammates.

One thing you gotta love about dedicated softball players: they’ll literally travel across the country to find the right fit to help them improve their game!

So it is with today’s spotlight standout, sophomore infielder/outfielder Maddie Gallagher who flies regularly from New York to Florida to work out with her club team, the Tampa Mustangs coached by Paul Walford.

Last month, the East Coast player committed to Bev Smith and the Gamecocks and this week Extra Inning Softball caught up with her to learn more about what it’s like to travel regularly down the coast to work out with her club team down in the Sunshine State and how that connection across state lines all started in the first place…

NAME: Maddie Gallagher
Hometown/ST: Port Washington, New York
Grad Year: 2020
Position(s): SS/2B/CF
Club Team: Tampa Mustangs – Walford
High School: Paul D. Schreiber High School, Port Washington, NY
GPA: 4.2
College: University of South Carolina
When Committed? January 2018
Other Universities Considered: North Carolina, Duke, Florida Atlantic, Fordham, Hofstra, Penn State, Boston College
Top Honors/Accomplishments: Varsity softballs starter since 7th grade; 8th and 9th grade All-County (2016 & 2017); 9th grade (2017) named to Newsday’s Top 100 Players on Long Island (only one of three freshman receiving that honor); 7th grade, 8th grade and 9th grade named as a Nassau County Scholar Athlete; 2015 USSSA National Championship Offensive MVP.
Other Sports: Varsity volleyball, also used to play AAU basketball, but gave up to train for softball.
Preferred College Major: undecided

***

Maddie gets ready to board her flight at JFK in New York to head to the Sunshine State.

How long is your commute to practice?
My commute to practice involves a 40-minute Uber ride to the airport, then a 2 ½ hour plane ride, followed by a 40 minute car ride. So, including arriving early to the airport to check in, my commute to practice takes about six hours. Whenever I can, I like to get to Florida a day early so I’m fresh for practice.

How did you find this team and why did you choose it?
Even though I live in New York, I knew about the Tampa Mustangs because they always did well in tournaments that I was also in. Last summer, I met a few of the girls at the Univ. of Florida camp when we were put into the same group. After the camp, we stayed in touch through snapchat and facetime. Following the camp, we actually played each other in the Atlanta Legacy tournament and coincidentally ran into each other getting lunch one day while playing in PGF in California. I was able to watch some of their games and cheer them on, and they did the same for me. Right after PGF, the girls told me a spot had opened up on their team and that I should join. Because I was able to play such great competition at PGF, I decided that I wanted to compete at the highest level possible and play in the best tournaments all the time. I felt that playing with the Tampa Mustangs would enable me to do this.

Since you can’t come to every practice, what’s your workout routine?
Every day I go out to the cages and work on hitting for at least an hour. There is a lot of tee work involved, then some front toss and a couple times a week my mom throws live BP to me. A few times a week my mom drives me to a field after school to work on fielding. She videos me practicing and sends it to my hitting and fielding coach, Kevin Maguire, who lives in Florida, and he then tells me what I need to work on and improve. Sometimes, we even do Facetime lessons with him while I’m hitting in my backyard. In addition to this, I weight train twice a week and do speed training three times a week.

Do you ever feel disconnected by the distance or are you close to your teammates?
I never feel that disconnected from my teammates because we always stay in touch through social media. However, not seeing them in person for a while makes seeing them even more exciting.

The sophomore says she became sold on USC on her second visit to the school.

Tell us about your recruiting journey in your own words:
My recruiting process started the summer after 7th grade. I began attracting the attention of a lot of schools in the Northeast and in eighth grade I took my first visit to Penn State University. After that, I had visits to Hofstra and Fordham and was very close to verbally committing, but then my mom thought it would be best to hold off because I didn’t know what I truly wanted at this point. This turned out to be the right decision because as I started maturing, I realized that I didn’t want to stay in the North anymore, and I started wanting to play at the highest level of softball that I could, with the hopes of making it to the SEC. I started looking down South and had visits to UNC and South Carolina. In addition to the softball programs, they both appealed to me because they are great academically.  I also knew that having the opportunity to cheer on different sports and attend other games at my school was something I wanted to have as a part of my college experience.

How did you “know” South Carolina was your school?
I knew that South Carolina was the school for me when I was on my second visit there. I had a moment where my mom and I were walking through the path of the athletic village to the softball stadium and it was absolutely gorgeous and so peaceful at the time. It just felt like home to me and I knew then that I wanted to spend 4 years there. I also felt very comfortable with Coach Bev and Coach Navas, and I thought that it would be amazing to play for them and to try to get to the Women’s College World Series under their coaching.

Maddie (middle) says she looks up most to her older sisters, Kailey (left) and Ashlynn.

Who do you look up to most?
Two people I look up to are my two older sisters, Ashlynn and Kailey.  They have made so many sacrifices for me—whether it is missing parties or hanging out with friends—to come see me play or not having my parents home for long periods of time when they are traveling with me.  They also have to do my chores when I’m away, and they don’t give me too much trouble for that even though it happens a lot.  Besides being my sisters, Ashlynn and Kailey are also my teammates.  This coming high school season will be the fourth one where we play together.  They never minded having me on their team and they always support me and cheer me on and try to pick me up if I’m not happy with my performance.  I know they do a lot of little things in their own way that help me become the player that I am.

What’s your favorite food?
My favorite food is tacos and whenever I am in Florida I always go to Tijuana Flats because we don’t have them in New York.

Best Softball Memory:
My favorite softball memory was the first game of my 9th grade season for school ball. It was my third year on varsity, and the year prior I won All-County as an eighth grader. I had really high expectations for myself to repeat as All-County so I put a ton of pressure on myself. We were going into the top of the 7th inning against our rivals and I was up. The score was 0-0 but then I hit a solo home run. As I was running home my teammates were so excited and screaming. They were chanting, “She’s a freshman.” This moment was awesome because I knew the rest of the season was going to be great.


Favorite College Player:
Kelsey Stewart who graduated from UF in 2016. I loved how she was a true triple threat being able to swing, slap and put a bunt down at anytime. Her defense is always so fun to watch.

More
articles

Get the Latest Updates

Subscribe To Our Weekly Newsletter

Sign up to receive immediate, daily, or weekly news updates!

Search

GET UPDATES
FOR COACHES

Fill out this form to be on Extra Inning Softball notifications list and be the first to get important updates and news specifically for coaches.

Transfer Tracker Updates

Fill out this form to submit your transfer updates. These changes are subject to approval.

Name(Required)
MM slash DD slash YYYY

Interested in an Extra Elite 100 shirt?

Fill out the form below to verify that you’re part of the Extra Elite!

Name(Required)
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.