Jacob Plourde
Equinox Staff
Haley and Laura Chandler are part of the backbone of the Keene State College softball team.
Both players have started at multiple positions in their career and both have played well at their positions.
[singlepic id=918 w=320 h=240 float=right]
“Laura plays center field and second base and Haley plays shortstop and first base,” Charlie Beach, the Keene State softball team Head Coach, said. “Both of them have been All-Conference in both positions.”
Haley and Laura are twins and are seniors at Keene State College. Laura studies athletic training while Haley is a secondary education and Spanish major.
Both sisters agree that their biggest help to one another is competition. They push each other and it makes them train harder.
“We are naturally competitive, we are constantly in competition with each other, for the most part it is just healthy competition,” Haley said.
Haley said the sisters compete about who can get the most steals, hits, who can get the best batting average, and things of that nature. However, Laura said she believes they motivate each other on and off the field.
“We have a healthy competition between us. Even in the gym we try to out lift each other, or keep up with each other,” Laura said, “on the field we are kind of hostile.”
Don’t take the fact the sisters are in constant competition as a sign of dislike, the sisters are very close to one another. “We have lived with each other the entire time we have been at Keene,” Laura said.
Haley said that the pair knows what each other is thinking, even to the point that they constantly finish each other’s sentences.
Coach Beach said that both girls are very supportive of each other. “I think it’s like an ‘I got your back sister’ kind of thing,” Beach said.
The twins didn’t always play softball, they played baseball up until they were 13-years-old in seventh grade. Haley said, “Our older brother was the one who taught us how to play sports, so we started by playing baseball.” Haley and Laura looked seriously at two colleges, Keene State and Endicott College, and even though Haley said Endicott was really impressive, she fell in love with Keene State.
“We came on a visit during the fall and I fell in love with it,” Haley said. “We had also watched Keene play and we liked the way they played.”
Laura said, “Both schools had the major I wanted, but I think for me it was Charlie [Beach], I enjoyed Charlie more.” Laura also said like the setup of Keene more, and that Endicott was a much smaller and more expensive school. Both girls said it was kind of an unspoken thing that they two would go to college together and play softball together.
“No one ever said it, but it was unspoken,” Haley said. “Our mom would suggest something and we would both look at it.” Haley and Laura are such important parts to the Keene State Softball team, both players play positions, bat in different parts of the lineup, and both leaders on a team looking to make a run at an NCAA tournament bid this season.
“They do so many thing so well so often, and are so steady and consistent all the time,” Beach said.Beach also said that he had never seen a combination of power and speed then Haley and Laura. “There may be faster players, and there may be better batting averages, but both of these two have the best combination I have seen,” Beach said.
Haley said her main goal this season was to make it to said NCAA tournament, because there are several seniors on the team and it would be a good end to a career at Keene State for the senior who have never made it to the NCAA tournament before.
“It tough to get the news that you didn’t make the NCAA tournament and that you are going to the ECAC’s instead,” Haley said. The KSC softball team is taking things one game at a time and are hoping the combination of experience of several upperclassmen and extremely talented freshmen will bring them to the tournament, as a team that Haley said are each other’s best friends.
Jacob Plourde can be contacted at jplourde@keene-equinox.com