Story by Rusty Ellis
Photo by Ben Craven / Herald-Citizen
Cookeville softball senior Shelby Radford made her next step official on Monday, signing her national letter of intent to play for the University of the Cumberlands after graduation.
For Radford, the signing was the culmination of all the time she’s put in throughout her career thus far.
“It was really exciting,” Radford said. “It was very rewarding, and a lot of hard work has been put into this…years spent traveling and playing lead up to that, so it was great.”
The recruiting process, normally a complicated one for many athletes, was actually rather simple for Radford. Her older sister playing there, as well as the size of the university were a couple of the positive factors that led to her choosing UC.
“I really didn’t visit any other schools,” Radford said. “My sister goes there and plays, and seeing how much fun she has, I thought it would be a good fit for me too…I like how small it is. I didn’t want to go to a big place, and I really like the coach.”
As far as what she says she’s going to miss at Cookeville, Radford again kept it really simple and talked about how much she would miss the friends she made and her coaches at Cookeville.
“I’m definitely going to miss my teammates, and Coach (Jordan) Webb,” Radford said. “I’ve loved playing for Coach Webb.”