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(This story has been updated to reflect Casey’s corrected win-loss record and ERA.)

By Jay Spivey

For the Clemmons Courier

Much like her mother, Shannon Casey, who was a longtime coach and assistant athletic director until retiring last June, Meredith is a softball pitcher at West Forsyth High School  

Shannon Casey, then Shannon Brooks, began her career as a student-athlete at West Forsyth during the 1988-89 school year as a volleyball, basketball and softball player. 

“I was about 4 years old,” Meredith said when she first picked up a softball. “I played since I was that little and my mom’s always pushed me to be the best I could be. And it’s just stuck with me my whole life.” 

Shannon, who is still teaching at West Forsyth, went on to play college softball at UNC Greensboro. 

“My grandpa had a picture of her when she played at UNCG,” Meredith said. “But that’s about everything I’ve seen.” 

And junior Meredith, a right-hander, is performing quite well this season. According to Coach Kevin Baity, as of Monday night, Meredith is 9-0 this season with a .162 ERA, and she has 43 strikeouts and 10 walks in helping the Titans to a 17-0 overall record, including 10-0 in the Central Piedmont 4-A conference.

And Meredith has done all of that while sharing time as a pitcher with sophomore Morgan Maxwell, who is a left-hander. 

“For most of my career I’ve wanted to go to UNCG, but as I’ve grown older, I’ve decided I wanted to go other places,” Meredith said. “But UNCG as I was younger has always been my No. 1 choice.” 

Obviously, Shannon has been a large influence on her daughter. 

“It just makes me want to work harder to make her and everyone around me proud,” Meredith said.  

So, Meredith, who lives in Davie County, started the grind of being a stellar softball player at a young age. She said she started with Little League Softball at Southwest Little League and Davie Little League, followed by coach-pitch right before she started pitching on her own. 

“I didn’t really get too serious until I was in 8U where I went to specific positions and how to actually play the game,” she said.

As Meredith grew and started to understand the sport, she saw it differently. 

“It was a lot more competitive,” she said. “It made me push myself harder because of the competition and I had the best.” 

Because of her mother’s job, Meredith has had a chance to really get to know all of the players and coaches in softball at West Forsyth over the years.  

“I’ve looked up to them my whole life, actually,” Meredith said.

Baity’s relationship with the family goes back even before Meredith was born. 

“I have (known her) since she was a baby because, as a matter-of-fact, Shannon played on the slow-pitch team that I coached before our kids were born,” Baity said.

Even the longtime coach of the Titans knew of Meredith during softball season. 

“I think with Shannon, you knew (Meredith) was going to be (a player),” Baity said. “Of course, Shannon posted a video of her when she was little bitty. As a matter of fact, she had my daughter’s (Laiken) bat bag, it might have even been T-ball. But I remember when she first started playing.”

One of Meredith’s favorite players growing up was a pitcher on the West Forsyth NCHSAA Class 4-A state championship team in 2016. 

“Brooke Perry was my No. 1 idol, I guess,” Meredith said. “When I was like 8, I took pictures of her jersey.”

Meredith said that Perry knew she was Meredith’s idol.

“She thought it was cool,” Meredith said. “I even made, the state-championship team, I made bracelets for them. I was their No. 1 fan.”

Baity knew that she idolized the players from the past.

“She knows what it takes to be a good teammate and for our team to be successful. I’m sure she’s heard it,” he said. “But, you know, she also followed us through that whole state championship run even though she was a little bitty girl. She came to everything. She came to every game, and you know, she knew what that team did together.”

After following the team closely for most of her childhood, Meredith entered West Forsyth as a wide-eyed freshman, but maybe not as wide-eyed as most freshmen.

“No, because I knew the school like the back of my hand,” Meredith said of not being intimidated by being a freshman at such a big school. “In the summer (before her freshman year) there were a couple classes that I wasn’t really sure (where they were) and she would walk me through the school, and like we had a free weekend.” 

Despite her knowing the surroundings, Meredith pitched on the JV team her freshman year. 

“It was a little difficult,” she said. “Just the mental side of it because I had good expectations, but I knew that the pitcher that was there (Cate Etchason on varsity), she was a senior. So, I wasn’t (playing ahead) of her, which was understandable.  

“I worked myself up thinking I was going to go in and start, but other than that once I got past the mental side it was good.” 

Then, came her sophomore year last season. And that proved to be another challenge.  

“I told her what she was going to do. I mean, it’s not like I gave her the option,” Baity said. “I just told her, you know, that I would like for her to double-roster and to play both JV and varsity because one, we had nobody on JV that could pitch, and you know I knew that if she double-rostered she still could come up and play for varsity, too, and get some games in.” 

In essence, according to Meredith, by her pitching on JV last year as a sophomore she allowed the other girls on the team a chance to play. Otherwise, they would’ve had no pitcher.

“It was a little hectic,” she said. “I had to bring all my uniforms and stuff for JV and all my stuff for varsity. And the rule with double-rostering is you can only play a certain amount of games. So, having to keep up with the games, making sure I was eligible.” 

According to Baity, if you double-roster in softball there is a 24-game regular-season limit. Also, there is a four games a week limit. She mostly pitched JV last season because of that, but the nights there was a JV and varsity game, she could only stand in the dugout and be dressed in uniform. If there was just a varsity game, she played varsity. 

“She definitely got more pitching time,” Baity said. “I mean, she was the pitcher, so she pitched every pitch in JV that they had. And you know, obviously it gave her a lot of confidence because she did pretty much dominate. But I think it also helped because she would not have gotten as much pitching time if she was strictly just playing varsity.”

The experience turned out for the best.

“It was honestly more rewarding than anything because those girls out there being excited gave them an opportunity to play, and it also gave me plenty of reps, getting better,” Meredith said. “It’s helped me in a tremendous amount of ways.”

That came to this year, her junior season. However, for many years Meredith would get up at the crack of dawn to work with a softball trainer before going to school on Mondays and Thursdays in Yadkin County.

“I get up around 6:30, (leave) around 7, and I’m up there by 7:30,” she said. “It’s honestly like 15 minutes. My trainer, he gives us softball-specific workouts and we do 20 reps of each thing. And it’s not about how many reps you do, it’s how much weight you do. And so, I’ve benefitted a lot, I’ve gained a lot of speed from it.”

All of that hard work has paid off, both for herself and for the team this season. Also, Meredith knows her role, pitching with Maxwell. 

“It’s kind of like a toss-up,” Meredith said. “It’s pretty even honestly.” 

And they’re two totally different pitchers.

“She’s a lefty,” Meredith said of Maxwell. “I think we’re a lucky team to have a lefty and a righty because also she has a lot more speed than me and I have spin. So, going from fast pitching with speed, with speed that’s right-handed it’ll trick the batter up.” 

Meredith is Maxwell’s biggest cheerleader. 

“They support each other. They pitch together, warm up together,” Baity said. “And it’s like I told you, when Morgan is pitching Meredith is standing right there beside me.”

Meredith also cheers for each player in the dugout. 

“I just make sure everyone’s energy is up because as soon as our energy gets down, the worse we play,” she said. “We hype everything up, otherwise you’re going to play to the team’s level, and you can’t do that.” 

In addition to being one of the last people to leave at the end of a practice or a game in order to rake the field, she is big on team-bonding activities like going to Top Golf, doing a hayride and gift exchange before Christmas and paint-splattering. 

“To have a good team you have to have a good relationship,” she said. “And I knew that this team, there is something special about it and if we wanted to go far, we had to get close. So, I planned these team-bonding things to hopefully get us closer together, working together well and, honestly, to prevent drama.”

Meredith also works alongside Linsey Ciccocioppo, who is the head trainer at West Forsyth from Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist, at mostly football games as a student trainer.

“Meredith considers that very important,” Baity said. “She loves helping Linsey, and I think she does a great job with it.” 

It’s worked out well, but there is still plenty of season remaining. The regular season is scheduled to conclude April 24 at home against East Forsyth. After that is the conference tournament and the NCHSAA playoffs. 

“We’ve just got to keep our guard up,” Meredith said. “We can’t think we’re better than we are. We have to stay humble and everything will be good.” 

This season’s team is senior laden, but next season Meredith and Taylor Alderman will likely be the lone seniors. 

“(The seniors) have made me a better person,” Meredith said. “They’ve helped me laugh about things, not take (things) seriously.” 

With a full season still to play, Meredith already has a plan after she graduates next year from West Forsyth. 

“I am committed to Caldwell Community College because I want to do occupational therapy, and that’s what I’m taking up there,” she said. “That helps me achieve my collegiate softball goals and then also get the major I want because I’ll have to do around seven years of school. 

“And so, my first two I can play at Caldwell and enjoy my (time) and get the easy classes out of the way. And my next school I plan is (transferring to) App (State). And when that’s done (at Caldwell) I focus on that instead of softball and that.”