I'm not as much taking on that leadership role, but I'm learning. But in that sense of when I was a freshman, and now I feel the same way here. In terms of my leadership, I feel like I've always been a natural born leader. There were seven freshmen and two juniors on the field, so all of us were just ecstatic and so excited when we won the championship. That feeling of winning was probably one of my favorite softball memories of all time. Then when we kept going in CIF and people saw how serious we were. So we came to the school and everyone was talking about how well the team was going to do.
That season kind of shocked everyone because a lot of people knew that there would be a lot of incoming softball players, including a bunch of my cousins who now play at Oklahoma. Anthony, and how did that success play a role in your leadership throughout your high school career?Ī: I remember that day like it was yesterday. Q: What was it like being part of the 2017 CIF-SS Division 6 championship your freshman year at St. I just feel like even if I don't know the Polynesian on the other team, at the end of the game it feels like we're family and that family sense is definitely there in the Polynesian community. Now that there are more Polynesians in the sport of softball, it kind of shows my younger cousins that they can play too. So seeing her and my older cousins play at the next level, I really wanted to do it too.
But we kind of both push each other to be better. So my dad was kind of glad that we weren't always butting heads on who is better. But she's an outfielder and I'm an infielder. We've always been competitive right when we both started. My older sister, Chloe, is a redshirt sophomore at Mississippi State. It's good because I have a lot of older cousins who played in college and who are still playing right now. Q: How do you celebrate your culture and roots of being Polynesian and how do you hope to inspire the younger up-and-coming generation of softball players?Ī: I think softball is definitely a sport for Polynesian girls because we do bring the strength. So he's definitely a huge support in my life. Every time I finish practice, he calls me and asks me how it was and what we did that day, always wanting to know what's going on. If he could go to my UCLA practices, he definitely would. He's been probably my number one support through everything and even to this day, he's always at every game. He says I'm definitely like him when he was younger in a lot of ways. But he would always end it with something like, 'I'm proud of you.' He knew he was pushing me and he was only doing it because he loved me. I definitely hated those car rides home for sure, because I knew he was always going to have something to say. Q: With your dad being a former football player at Arizona and now a football coach, what was your relationship like with your dad growing up?Ī: Growing up, he was basically my coach. My dad played football at Arizona, and I knew I wanted to play at the next level as well, so I started taking everything more seriously as I got older. My family has always been into athletics. My parents were putting in the money to travel and participate, and I wanted to make sure that all of the money they put in wasn't going to waste. I knew I wanted to compete at the next level. But I think I knew that softball was the sport for me when I started travel ball at eight years old. I did T-ball with my siblings and cousins. Q: How old were you when you started playing softball, and when did you know it would be the sport to take you to the next level?Ī: I started softball when I was around six years old. Anthony High School in Long Beach and played club with Firecrackers - Rico/Weil. Malau'ulu, a left-handed hitting infielder, prepped at St. The 12th installment of "Getting to Know…" features Thessa Malau'ulu, a freshman on the softball team.
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