CLINCHPORT — Rye Cove was a dominant force on the softball diamond over the last two seasons.
The Eagles were 52-4 record, won the Class 1 state championship last season and were state runners-up in 2023.
Five starters are gone from that team, all of whom are now playing at the college level, but the Eagles are still shooting for the top.
“Our expectations are we just want to compete,” Rye Cove head coach Nick Hood said. “The goal is every year to be there playing the last game of the season. That should be your goal and if that is not our goal we are not doing our job.”
Rye Cove (1-1) opened the season with a 10-0 win over Virginia High on Tuesday, but dropped an 11-0 home decision to Holston on a brutally cold and windy Thursday at the Eagles’ Nest.
“We are going to go through some growing pains, we understand that,” Hood said. “We have got some younger girls in some key positions. That is just part of it.”
One of those returnees is Kenzie Hood, who set a school record for career RBIs on Tuesday, and eagerly anticipates what lies ahead for this collection of Eagles.
“I am very excited,” said Kenzie Hood, who is committed to play college softball at Bluefield University. “I am excited to see what God has in store for us. We have just got to take it game by game and put it in His hands.”
He certainly helped the Eagles reached new heights the last two seasons, a team that was led in the circle by current East Tennessee State hurler Eden Muncy. Gracie Turner (King) and Maddy Wood (Bluefield) were also key components of that run, along with two others that played during the fall for Southwest Virginia Community College.
“We have got a mixture of some experience and some young kids,” Nick Hood said. “We have got to practice better, we have got to prepare better. Some of that is on me, but we will work on that.”
With Muncy, who has appeared in nine games this season, now pitching for the Buccaneers, Rye Cove will turn to a combination of sophomore Allison Akers and Kenzie Hood in the circle. Both saw action against the Cavaliers, which banged out 12 hits and scored multiple runs in a trio of innings as Akers struggled to find the strike zone in miserable weather conditions.
“Akers is going to throw the majority of the innings.” Nick Hood said. “We need her to work ahead, today she worked behind. You just can’t work from behind, if you work from behind things happen.”
Holston pitcher Riley Cobler struck out 12, walked two and allowed a seventh inning single to Gracen Chavez. Kenzie Hood, who was 5-for-5 with a home run, six RBIs and earned the win in the circle against Virginia High, is confident in what lies ahead, with a roster that includes several fellow seniors, including Jazz Stanley, Sara Byrd, Rheagan Waldon, Harley Cress and Gracie Byrd, with most of them joining Hood in the lineup on Thursday.
“I think we have a lot of experienced girls that know they need to step up, they are getting there,” Kenzie Hood said. “I think we are getting there. It is going to take a lot of hard work to even be close to how we were the past two years. We lost a lot last year so it is tough. I have been playing with every single one of them girls pretty much since was like seven years old."
It still very early in a season that won’t crown a champion until June so the Eagles have time to develop some much-needed experience before the always-competitive Cumberland District slate begins in April.
“In my opinion the Cumberland District, top to bottom, will be the best district in the state,” Nick Hood said. “Eastside should, in my opinion, win it hands down. Twin Springs won’t be far behind them, Twin Springs has some young kids that they have got up, some holdbacks, that are in ninth grade this year so they are pretty tough. Eastside is well-coached and they have a two-headed monster on the mound. They will be good.”
Expect the same for Rye Cove. Just ask Kenzie Hood, who loves her Eagles.
“I love Rye Cove softball. I love Rye Cove, I love everything about it,” she said. “Softball is all I know. I have been playing softball since I couldn’t even tell you when, but Rye Cove softball is just different. It is family.”