Use any major metric, and it's clear Ashley Rogers did not have her best season as a Tennessee softball pitcher.
The former Meigs County High School star battled injuries throughout this spring, which relegated the 5-foot-10 senior to half the starts she was able to provide as a freshman in 2019 and again last season. Even an opportunity to punch Tennessee's ticket to a Knoxville Regional title was squashed Sunday afternoon, as she was able to face just seven Oregon State batters.
Yet this was the furthest thing from a lost season for Rogers, according to Lady Vols coach Karen Weekly, who believes that her proven ace simply received the gift of imperfection.
"Ashley is a perfectionist, and it's why she's had so much success in her life," Weekly said this past weekend. "It's why she graduated with a 4.0 in Kinesiology. It's why she's gotten an award for the highest academic achievement in that program.
"We've talked a lot throughout her career about it being OK if you're not perfect, and I think this year she realized that she didn't have a choice."
Tennessee's season ended Sunday with 8-3 and 3-1 losses to the Beavers, which left the Lady Vols with a 41-18 record. Rogers had entered Sunday's opener with a 23-inning scoreless streak that she extended to 24, but the first three OSU batters reached in the second inning to give the Beavers a 1-0 lead, and her afternoon and season were done.
Rogers went 12-6 with a 2.01 earned run average this year with 128 strikeouts in 104 innings, allowing an opposing batting average of .156.
"It's no secret that this year has been tough for me health-wise, which made it tough for me mentally to go through," Rogers said. "The support I've had from this team and this coaching staff is something I'll be forever grateful for. They just encouraged me to go out there and be myself no matter what. I may not be 100% or have my best stuff every time I walk out there, but I've been able to trust that the team will have my back the whole way.
"That became a weight off of my shoulders, and I think it made a huge difference."
Rogers was never far from perfection at Meigs County, compiling a 90-8 record her last three years and watching her ERA numbers improve from 0.62 as a sophomore to 0.27 as a junior to 0.20 in her final season. She was a three-time Times Free Press Best of Preps softball player of the year, a two-time Gatorade state player of the year, and her 80 strikeouts as a junior in the state tournament set a TSSAA record.
The adjustment to Southeastern Conference play offered little resistance for Rogers, who went 21-7 as a freshman and finished second in the league with 209 strikeouts. A back injury shelved her for the COVID-shortened 2020 season, but she came back last year to go 26-10 and led the league in innings pitched (217), ERA (1.32) and opposing batting average (.132).
Then this injury-riddled season arrived, which Weekly said resulted in Rogers having to change how she practiced and manage games.
"It was an understanding that she may not have everything she had before, but she could still go out there and be great for her team," Weekly said. "I couldn't be more proud of her, because when you're an elite athlete, that's not easy to do. It's hard when you have to understand that you may have to redefine yourself and embrace a new normal. I use the word embrace, because that's the important thing.
"She didn't just accept it. She embraced it, and that's why she's performed like she has."
Weekly added that it took multiple conversations with Rogers to work through the process, and there is a looming conversation between the two that will be of significance as well. Rogers still has eligibility remaining, and Weekly said after Sunday's two losses that she has not spoken with Rogers about her future.
If Rogers does call it a career, she will have left many memories in Knoxville, including her 13-inning performance in a 1-0 win over Mississippi State at the SEC tournament earlier this month that set a program record for stamina. She threw 161 pitches and yielded just three hits in that triumph, but Weekly takes great satisfaction in pointing to her only having seven strikeouts.
"That was the moment," Weekly said. "I was so proud of her for how she embraced this journey."
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com.