In today’s episode of This Hits Different, Shelby Cassesse tells the story of North Hills softball player Miranda Groll, who is finally getting a chance to play softball following covid and injuries.
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Miranda Groll was at one time a three-sport athlete, but it was softball, and the girls she grew up playing with, that always had her heart.
“Just being with them, every year, and being best friends is definitely what helped,” Groll says. “And being super close to everyone.”
After getting in a full soccer and basketball season her freshman year, COVID-19 canceled the spring softball season.
Unfortunately, the center-fielder would have to wait much longer to play softball than she thought.
“In September during soccer, I tore my left ACL,” she says. “So I was out the rest of the soccer season, basketball season and most of the softball season.”
Her rehab kept her out through her sophomore season, and she returned to soccer for her junior year.
But one evening during a game, she heard an all too familiar pop.
“I was just starting to get my confidence back, playing soccer,” she says. “At Pine-Richland during a soccer game, I tore my right ACL.”
Longtime head Coach Libby Gasior remembers getting the text.
“’Hey coach, I’m really sorry, I don’t think I’m going to make it to the morning fall ball,’” Gasior recalls. “‘Something is wrong with my knee.’ And I’m like, ‘but not like that, right?’ And she’s like, ‘no, I think like that.’
“It was heartbreaking because she brings so much in leadership and the kids are drawn to her, because she works so hard at everything she does.”
Groll says both rehabs were tough, but there was something extra tough about going through it a second time, and losing out on yet another season of softball.
“I knew I had like six months of nothing to play, or anything like that,” she says.
But she says it was her teammates who kept her going, as she attended every game, practice and team event possible.
“Even if I had PT, I came afterwards and hung out with the team,” Groll adds. “That was my safe place. My teammates always lifted me up.”
By the end of the season, she was able to play as a runner. That journey an emotional memory for her head coach.
“That was awesome for them to see, because they were so attached to her,” Gasior says. “But they were also pulling for her in a way that was really special.”
That type of dedication through injury has become the standard on the North Hills Softball team and created a senior leader in Miranda.
She made it to her final softball season injury-free, poised to make a run with the group who has long had her back.
She's also soon headed to Pitt Bradford to play, taking with her a new perspective and path that only comes from losing something you love, even temporarily.
“Not to take anything for granted,” she says. “Going through those injuries and the PT, it made me realize that I want to go into something in that field.
“I’m going to study exercise science, and hopefully I can help younger athletes when they get hurt and keep their spirits high.”