Julia Shearer – initially a reluctant pitcher – went on to have a historic high school career. A generational player, her story is about more than statistics and awards, although both are noteworthy and deserving mention. (Action photos courtesy of Kadi Schenk: https://solsports.zenfolio.com/f983803863. Gatorade POY photo: Maryland softball, Newtown Rock Gold-Garvey photo provided by Rock Gold Garvey, and remaining photos provided by family and friends.)
Roll back the calendar to Jan. 10, 2021.
The setting is the PGF Arizona Winter Invitational, and Newtown Rock Gold Garvey 18U is facing the Corona Angels. Julia Shearer – Rock Gold’s sophomore centerfielder – found herself in the pitching circle.
“When she was very young, her parents said to me, ‘Do you think she can pitch at the next level? Do whatever you think is the right thing to do,’” coach Joe Garvey recalled. “We were a young team that year, and at the end of the tournament, we let her pitch, and she shut out one of the best teams in the country, the Corona Angels. I went over to her dad afterwards and laughed and said, ‘Yeah, she’s a pitcher.’
“They were at a crossroads. They knew she was a good athlete. I’m a big believer personally that you should really play out your dreams as far as you can because you never know how it changes.”
Shearer’s dream back then? Play outfield at the Division 1 level, and she was well on her way to being the best at that position, earning first team all-state honors as a sophomore for a Knights’ squad that – anchored by senior pitcher Mady Volpe - captured the 2021 PIAA 6A state title. Her script was going exactly as planned.
But the best laid plans sometime change, and so do dreams, and Shearer is in College Park as a pitching recruit at the University of Maryland.
Garvey is not surprised.
“I encouraged her to be a pitcher,” he said. “She’s a phenomenal athlete. I continued to tell her she’s both (an outfielder and pitcher) and live the dream for both.
“The one coach from Maryland kept saying, ‘I’m signing her as an outfielder and a hitter.’ Me and my assistant coach laughed and said, ‘She’ll be the best pitcher you ever had before it’s over,’ and she really will be. I believe that because Julia puts the time in, puts the effort in. She doesn’t let the moment get too big, and she’s probably got the best change-up in the world.”
Garvey would certainly get no argument from North Penn coach Rick Torresani. Although the veteran coach acknowledges Shearer’s transformation from outfielder to pitcher was not immediate.
“Sophomore year she was throwing, but it was – ‘I’m a centerfielder, and I don’t want to pitch,’” Torresani recalled. “I said, ‘Okay, but if we need you, you’re going to pitch.’
“After the ’21 season, I told her, ‘You’re our pitcher for the next two years.’ Again, it was ‘I’m a centerfielder.’ I said, ‘Julia, you’re going to be our pitcher.’ She made a comment, ‘Well, coach, I don’t want to pitch every game.’ I said, ‘We’ll see.’”
Shearer never played center field for the Knights again, instead throwing every inning but two as a junior in a state semifinal season while earning 2022 PA Gatorade Player of the Year honors. One year later, Shearer was close to perfect, winning 28 straight games – including a perfect game in the postseason - while leading the Knights to a historic season that included capturing the District 1 6A crown as well as the PIAA 6A state title. She was an obvious choice for 2023 PA Gatorade Player of the Year as well as PAHSCA Pitcher of the Year after earning first team all-state for the third consecutive year..jpg)
Shearer also was one of 20 players chosen by SBLive Sports in the running for national high school softball player of the year and was named a first team MaxPreps All-American as well as a first team Extra Inning Softball All-American.
Her hitting stats are dazzling: .639 batting average, 53 hits, 34 RBIs, 11 home runs (program single season record), .714 on-base percentage, 1.168 slugging percentage. And pitching? The southpaw was brilliant with stats that will be all but impossible to duplicate: 0.21 ERA (she allowed five earned runs), 355 strikeouts in 166 innings with 22 shutouts in 28 games.
“When the game is on the line, there’s nobody better,” Torresani said. “I’ve never had a kid in 30 years or seen a kid in 30 years do what she’s done for this program. She’s the best player I’ve ever seen in the state and maybe nationally. She just does everything right.”
“To be honest, a kid like Julia is why I coach softball,” Garvey said. “It’s why I stay in the game. Julia did the work. She’s as special as they get, and I’ve been doing this for a long time.”
Humble beginnings
Shearer wasn’t always a softball star. As a matter of fact, she was a very reluctant softball player.
“I remember it vividly – when I was five or six years old, my parents said to me, ‘All right, you need to pick a sport,’ and I was like ‘I don’t really like anything. I
don’t want to play sports,’” she said. “I just wanted to sit around all day or whatever. I did dance when I was four, but I don’t think that really counts.”
With a softball diamond just a 10-minute walk from her house, Shearer signed up for rec league softball.
“I had one of those baby plastic gloves, so I had to go and buy all new equipment,” she said. “I remember saying to my dad after the first practice, ‘This is so boring. I don’t want to do this. Get me out of here.’
“I hated it because my problem was – hitting off a tee was so boring to me. It was coach pitch, but it was practice hitting off a tee. We were doing that, and it was so boring just practicing and stuff. I told my dad, ‘I need to quit.’”
That didn’t happen.
“Some of my best friends when I was a kid I met through my softball team, so I stuck with it,’ Shearer said.
And was she good immediately?
“I don’t know how to tell when a six-year-old is good,” Shearer said. “I started pitching when I was seven. I guess I was good for a seven-year-old, but I think it was because I was a really tall, lanky kid, so I could actually make it to the plate, but that was about it.”
When she was 10, Shearer joined the Horsham Banshees on the travel circuit where she met Kayley York, who has known Shearer as both a teammate and opponent.
“We met around 10 years old,” said the Souderton grad, who is continuing her softball career at Rider University. “My dad was looking for another player for our team, so we headed to the home run derby at the field behind our house, and that’s when my dad asked Mr. Shearer if she wanted to join our team.
“She was definitely a little shy when I first met her, but we instantly had a connection and have been best friends ever since.”
The move to the Banshees also united Shearer with Sarah Sabocsik, who would go on to become her batterymate in high school, but neither was looking that far down the road.
“Once you’re on a travel team, you become friends quickly,” Sabocsik said. “I was completely shy – I don’t talk to anyone until I know them very well.
“She definitely expressed herself more than I did. You could tell she was fun and energetic as soon as you met her.”
It didn’t take long to realize Shearer was blessed with talent.
“She was always one of the top players on the team, and everyone could see that,” Sabocsik said.
Neither could have imagined they’d not only developed a longstanding friendship but were in the earliest stage of a relationship that would take both to unimaginable heights –Shearer was named the overall PAHSSBCA All State Player of the Year (all classifications) while Sabocsik was the Class 6A All-State Player of the Year.
Moving on up
Interestingly, Shearer did not play softball in middle school, opting instead to compete in track in the spring. To many, she was an unknown entity when she entered high school.
Reyna Doherty – now one of Shearer’s closest friends – went to the same middle school as her future teammate.
“We actually had class together in eighth grade and sat across from each other, but we didn’t talk at all,’ Doherty said. “I had art with her in ninth grade, but going into spring season, we were still obviously not best friends. Because she did track in middle school, no one knew she was going to be playing softball in high school, so it was kind of a surprise.
“I heard all these things about her as a player, and I was honestly intimidated by her, but she’s the sweetest person ever. She’s a goofball, and we became friends and have been ever since.”
Doherty got a firsthand look at Shearer in the circle, going against her at practice.
“She threw against us freshman year, and she actually hit me twice,” Doherty said with a laugh, acknowledging she never faced her again after a ninth grade season that was cancelled due to COVID. That formidable task was left to the Knights’ opponents.
Shearer points to joining Newtown Rock Gold-Garvey on the travel circuit when she was a sophomore as a turning point in her softball career. She anchored the outfield in center and right but saw some action in the circle.
“I encouraged her to be a pitcher,” Garvey said. “I think it was about building the confidence to believe because she got to come out at a young age and see what
big ball is about. At PGF Nationals, she saw at a young age how great these UCLA and Arizona pitchers were.”
That summer, several of Rock Gold Garvey’s pitchers struggled with injuries.
“It was like me and another girl who were left, so they had to use me,” Shearer said. “I think that’s when I started showing I actually could be a pitcher and an outfielder at the same time. That’s when it started.”
The stage was set for a junior season that – with Shearer in the circle - ended with a District 1 6A title and a trip to the state semifinals where the Knights were upset by eventual state champion Spring-Ford 2-0 (both runs were unearned). She was named the 2022 PA Gatorade Player of the Year but had some unfinished business, which she and her Knights’ teammates took care of as a senior this past spring.
“When you’re a travel ball player and you’re an elite travel ballplayer and are around elite travel players all the time – you develop an attitude,” Torresani said. “It’s not a bad attitude, but it’s an attitude – I’m the best, I know I’m the best.’ In her junior year, she was pitching for the first time competitively at the level we needed. She was developing an attitude where in center field, she could say – I’m the best.
“As a pitcher, she wanted to be the best because that’s who Julia is. Julia realized in order to be the best she had to work out so hard in the winter going into ‘22. She was relentless working with her pitching coach, and that’s where Julia takes a step above anybody I’ve ever had because Julia was not going to be denied being the best player out there, no matter what position, but she knew it was going to take hard work.”
Shearer put in the work with her pitching coach – Joe Ferguson - and at Relentless Athletics. It was a year-round commitment. As a junior she was reunited with her travel ball teammate from her younger years to form a formidable battery.
“I think what makes her so good is just her dedication to the game and how she wants to improve every day and every game,” Sabocsik said. “It’s her overall leadership that makes her such a good player and how she doesn’t crack under pressure and just how she plays the game and plays it for us.”
Doherty was a mainstay in the outfield for three years, the last two behind Shearer. Through 27 games heading into the state title game in June, the Knights outfielders had to field just 11 balls.
“It’s an awesome feeling being able to trust your pitcher,” Doherty said. “Obviously, she’s not doing everything, but she’s getting so many outs for us. You still have to be ready, but she’s such a good player, and you had complete confidence all around. She always wants to win – she’s definitely is competitive.”
Moving on
While Sabocsik was a fixture behind the plate in high school, Delaney Reefe was the same in travel for Rock Gold Garvey and will team up with Shearer at Maryland where they will be roommates.
“As a pitcher, I think she’s just super selfless,” Reefe said. “She just wants to do whatever is best for the team, and she’s ready to play.
“She and I are usually pitching and catching the majority of the games, and she never complains. She just gets on the mound, and she does her thing. She’s definitely very selfless and just a gamer.”
Both players committed to Maryland in October of 2021.
“It’s funny – on our unofficial visit the first time we ever met, I thought she was super shy, but then after getting to know her, we’ve opened up a lot and we’ve gotten super close after playing together and both going to college together,” Reefe said. “We always know we’re going to have each other’s back for the next four years.”
Interestingly, Reefe’s resume mirrors her future roommate’s. She was the 2023 Maryland Gatorade Player of the Year and - pressed into service in the circle this spring – led her Urbana High School team to the Maryland 4A state championship. She compiled a 20-3 record with a 1.04 ERA while batting .557 with 11 home runs (identical to Shearer), 33 runs scored, 37 RBIs and a 1.200 slugging percentage.
Reefe - who joined Rock Gold Garvey shortly after committing to Maryland - is familiar with Shearer’s composure that was regularly on display during a perfect high school season.
“If a pitch isn’t working, which is rare for her, she doesn’t let it get to her at all,” Reefe said. “She laughs it off mid-game – ‘That’s all right, we’ll work on that later, and we’ll throw all the other pitches I can throw.’”
Shearer has a changeup that can make batters look foolish.
“It’s definitely challenging and fun at the same time (facing her), but no matter what – she’s is still trying to strike me out, and her changeup definitely got me good,” York said with a laugh.
“That’s her second best pitch,” Reefe said of Shearer’s changeup. “I’d say the reason she’s so consistent and reliable on the mound is her curveball.
“She can throw that thing – it’s like a pitching machine. She throws a curveball, and she throws a backdoor curve, and it’s money every time.”
Shearer admits her softball career has exceeded any expectations she might have had.
“When I was younger, maybe up until I was 13 or 14, I had no idea my potential or what I even wanted to do after high school,” Shearer said. “My sophomore year when I started playing for that big team (Rock Gold Garvey), I got more attention than I expected, and that’s when my goals started taking off. I wanted to play at a high D1 level.”
While playing high level travel softball certainly opened doors for Shearer, it was an unparalleled high school career that was the game changer.
“I had no expectations coming into high school doing any of this,” Shearer said. “High school softball has changed a lot for me. It showed the potential I had, and it showed me that I’m able to do a lot more than I think I’m capable of. That’s basically my thought process. I’m honestly still not comprehending everything that’s happening.
“Looking back, even when I was a kid, I had so many things in my life – if they were different, I wouldn’t be here right now in this position. Starting to play for that rec softball league – that was the beginning. The awards, the college I’m going to – if that never started, none of this would be happening. I look back and realize how lucky I am that my life turned out this way.”
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