BY BRETT MARSHALL
When the 2025 softball season was just getting started back in late March, the pitching duties for the Great Bend Lady Panthers was going to be divided between Chayla Prendergast and Braelyn Turner.
That was the plan until Turner sustained an injury that limited her to 152/3 innings. Backup pitcher Alyssa McCauley threw 331/3 innings.
That left the bulk of innings to Prendergast and she responded with 121.2 innings to finish the year with a 14-4 record, a 2.99 earned-run-average and 124 strikeouts. 6A state qualifier Derby, 5A qualifiers Maize South and Topeka Seaman and Newton beat Prendergast.
She earned WAC Player of the Year honors in a vote of the conference’s coaches.
Prendergast describes herself as an efficient pitcher, translating that into staying ahead of the batters in the count — 0-1, 1-2 — not yielding many walks.
“I like to stay ahead in the count, so I can throw the pitch that I want,” Prendergast said. “A lot depends on the batter and their style. I’ll use pitches that have a lot of movement.”
Prendergast uses a combination of six different pitches — change-up, drop, curve, screwball, rise and fastball.
“The drop is my favorite,” Prendergast said. “This year, I gave more focus to my change-up because it’s such a hard motion to perfect. You still have to keep your motion fast so you can fool people.”
Prendergast was dominant in WAC games -- 8-0, with 56 strikeouts in 49 innings to lower her ERA to 1.57.
“My rise ball is my newest pitch that I learned last summer at camp,” Prendergast said. “I use it more against the big swingers. It’s a difficult pitch for me to learn and I’m still a little rough with it, but it got better.”
The variety of pitches in her repertoire allowed her to keep hitters off balance.
“I threw the curve a lot this year and I’ve got that mastered,” Prendergast said. “I like to use it on the corners both to right and left-handed batters.”
Prendergast proved she was just more than an outstanding pitcher when she came to the plate. She finished this season batting .310 with two home runs and 14 RBIs.
“My freshman year, I was nervous at the plate,” Prendergast said. “This year, I had more fun and gained confidence.”
Minton agreed.
“She worked hard on her hitting and it showed,” Minton said of Prendergast. “She’s like the other girls in that she wants to continue to get better. She works so hard in all aspects of the game.”
