Q&A: Marissa Young settling in as Duke softball's first head coach

Duke took a big step toward adding softball as its 27th varsity sport when it hired Marissa Young to be the program’s first head coach in July. Young, a former All-America pitcher at Michigan and assistant coach at North Carolina, is now faced with recruiting a team to field for the 2018 season and helping fine-tune the details of a new softball facility. The Chronicle’s Ryan Hoerger spoke with Young about adjusting to Duke and her strategy for building the Blue Devil program from scratch.

The Chronicle: You’ve had some recruits visiting on campus already. What’s your recruiting pitch for a program that won’t play a game for a couple more years?

Marissa Young: It’s been a whirlwind. We’ve had a ton of kids that are excited about the program and interested in the opportunity to be A) here at Duke and B) part of the first team ever. So that’s been exciting. That in itself has kind of sold the program for us. People know that Duke is an amazing university, a place where you’re going to get a very good education and also be able to compete in one of the best softball conferences in the nation. That’s made my job really easy. For me as a coach, I want to be as competitive as possible from year one, and I know that a lot of people want to wait and see how it’s going to go or expect that it’s going to take some years to get the program up and running, but I want kids that are ready to come in here and be gritty and work hard and compete from year one. That’s what I’m looking for as a coach in the recruits that are coming.

TC: What have been your priorities in recruiting?

MY: Pitching staff was first and foremost on the list.... We did handle that first and now we’re trying to work our way around the field. Obviously, because I recruited right down the road [at North Carolina] and recruited in the same conference, I have a lot of connections right off the bat from people and programs with the right type of kids to get us going. We have a great pool of kids, we’re going to be looking at some junior college kids over the fall as well.

TC: Where are these recruits coming from?

MY: California, Georgia and Florida are typically hotbeds for good softball players.

TC: What has the transition been like, coming from down the road at North Carolina?

MY: I’m thankful that we’re not playing each other for a couple of years. I’m thankful and won’t ever forget where I came from, but I’m really excited to be on this side of the rivalry and always knew Duke was an amazing place, but now to be on the inside, I love it even more.

TC: What have you learned at your various coaching stops along the way that inform what kind of coach you’re going to be here at Duke?

MY: I started as a Division II coach and then went to a mid-major and worked my way up, so I’m thankful that I’ve had the preparation and experience of having to do it all, from painting the dugouts to dragging my own field to now being at a place where we have more resources, but I think it’s given me a wide range of being able to see things from different vantage points and being prepared to win in the ACC.

TC: You said you want to compete in year one—do you have a five-year plan for where you want the program to be?

MY: I think in five years we will definitely be in the top five in our conference and competing in regionals as well.

TC: How involved have you been in laying out designs for the new stadium?

MY: We have drawings laid out already, it hasn’t been approved yet.... [Duke] had had sort of a plan and started working on it before they hired me, but since I’ve come on board we’ve had several sit-down meetings to tweak what was already in place to be sure that the place was going to be functioning and exactly what we need as we move forward. So I’ve been really excited to be able to be able to tweak those little details.

TC: The program is going to phase in its scholarships through 2021. How do you plan on allocating them for the time being?

MY: Thankfully the administration has been really supportive with me in saying ‘Do what we need to do’ to be successful. Obviously we can’t give all 12 scholarships that we have in year one, so it’s really going to come down to the personnel that we bring in and what our needs are in order to be able to land the kids that we need to be successful. It is going to be tricky, a balancing act to bring in 14, 15 kids [in that first year] without using up all of the money. We will be splitting up scholarships quite a bit.

TC: Have you had any interactions with Duke’s club softball team at all?

MY: I met with the club president during the club fair they had out there, and that’s been our only interaction so far. I know she was recruiting some other kids to fill her squad, and once they got up and running I was going to come out and meet with them and see if there were any potentials.

TC: What did you like about your coaches when you were playing?

MY: Just holding me to high standards on the field, off the field, making sure that I display myself and our program in a positive manner, and I think that’s what I carry on as a coach as well. I want the best for my players, and I’m going to push them to be their best. I’m going to be their biggest fan but also their toughest critic. My coaches related well to me and I think as a coach I do that with my players—I want to be on their level to where they’re comfortable to come in my office and talk about anything. We’re in this together—this isn’t a coach-and-player, this is we’re a team working for the same goals.

TC: Have you rounded out your coaching staff, or is that still a work in progress?

MY: We are still working on that. I came on board early in the summer, and so I wanted to get here, get my feet on the ground, get things up and running before bringing on staff.

TC: Softball pitchers eat up so many innings—that one position might be more important than any single position in any other sport. As a former pitcher, what’s your approach to filling out a pitching staff?

MY: You live and die with your pitcher, and obviously in the ACC we play a three-game series, so typically your opponent sees your ace at least twice in that series. It’s important you either have a workhorse that’s going to carry the team, or you develop a really good staff that is going to give teams different looks—kind of the more baseball style of a starter, a reliever and a closer. As a pitcher, that is huge in figuring out what their strengths and weaknesses are, so that we can build a good team. Because it’s tough in today’s softball to just expect one pitcher to carry the team, so we are definitely recruiting a great staff.

TC: Arm injuries have become such a big concern in baseball these days. What is it about the softball delivery that allows a pitcher to pitch so much?

MY: The under-arm motion is a lot easier on the shoulder, but what were are seeing is a lot more hip and back issues from softball pitchers. We have developed a great rehab/preventative program for pitchers in their daily routine to address core, hips and backs to prevent that.

TC: What’s been the biggest difference being at Duke compared to other places you’ve been in your career?

MY: I’m just really appreciative for the support that we’ve had here on campus from all the other coaches, different programs and support staff that have helped us hit the ground running, so that’s been great.... This really is a family, and people here, I’ve never had where people are willing to take so much time out of their day to come help and make sure that we have what we need, that we’re learning our way around and learning the system. To me that’s been evidence that this place is special right from the start.