Alexandra “Alex” Akins is a junior right-handed pitcher/shortstop from Hyde Park High in Austin, Texas who has twice been an invitee to the USA Softball High Performance Program National Selection Event.

Alex was ranked at No. 7 in the 2028 HOT 100 last month and has shined at the club and high school levels, including leading Hyde Park to an exciting 11-10 in last year in the TAPPS DII state softball championship.

This summer for the Texas Bombers – Sunday team, she had five wins and pitched four shutouts with a .153 batting average against, a 1.429 WHIP, a 2.47 ERA and 39 strikeouts in 23.8 innings.

A standout in the classroom as well with a 3.99 GPA, Alex recently committed to Colorado State on her official visit and shares with us why she is excited to play for the Rams in the Pac-12 Conference.

However, when that initial Sept. 1 call came from CSU Head Coach Michelle Gascoigne, Alex was so nervous, she hilariously had to ask her parents what to do!

Their response was… well, you’ll just have to keep reading to find out, but obviously it all worked out in the end!

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I had been thinking about and preparing for the events of September 1 from the time I started playing 10U, but I still was not ready for all of the nerves and emotions that consumed me that day. 

I knew I had done everything I could over the preceding years to be recruited. All of the time I’d spent in the gym and at hitting, fielding, and pitching lessons had not gone unnoticed.

I maintained an online presence and consistent contact with my schools of interest. I had played for top teams at the biggest events and knew I was on the radar of several top programs. 

During my early years of playing, I attended all levels of camps. I wanted to get a feel for what the differences were between P4 programs and mid-majors as well as DII and DIII programs. 

Once I began playing 14U, I only went to camps where I knew the staff had shown interest in me or where I was invited by the coaches to attend.

We would always try to spend an entire weekend in the town where the college was so we could drive around and get a feel for the area as well as take a tour of the campus on our own.  

I also had a recruiting coordinator at NCSA that I worked with and was able to get insight and feedback on programs and their level of interest in me. 

This allowed me to have a pretty solid list of programs that I wanted to attend and that I felt would be contacting me on September 1.

This year a different process was in place so no calls or text messages could be sent by colleges until 1 pm that afternoon. No more of the midnight calls, thank goodness!

My school takes our phones during class hours, so I had to wait until after school to see what calls and messages I received. Even with feeling so prepared for the moment, I was still so nervous looking at my phone. 

I was so excited to see the messages and know my hard work had indeed paid off. 

(Head) Coach (Michelle) Gascoigne with Colorado State had left me a voicemail saying she would call back when I was out of school. 

My travel ball organization, the Texas Bombers, had recently done a recruiting Zoom call led by Cat Osterman where she discussed what to expect during a recruiting call with coaches and what questions to ask so I felt prepared.

Coach Gascoigne called that evening as I was heading home from a training session.

It’s funny to think about it looking back, but I was so excited and nervous when her call came that I couldn’t even answer it at first, and I remember asking: “Oh my gosh, it’s Coach Gascoigne, what do I do?” 

My parents simultaneously shouted: “Answer it!”

I had just been to two CSU camps over the summer and worked with Coach Gascoigne so our talk was easy and familiar.  She congratulated me on my hard work and then said they wanted me to come back to campus as soon as possible for an official visit. 

The next 10 days waiting to go back to CSU and meet with the coaches was a blur. I talked to my recruiting coordinator again before going and he reminded me to really enjoy the process and soak it all in. 

I knew CSU checked all of the boxes for what I wanted in the perfect program, so I told my mom on the flight out that I didn’t need to schedule any other visits to any other programs. 

The whole visit was amazing, and as I was sitting with Coach Gascoigne and (Assistant) Coach (Tony) Smith and they were asking me and my parents what we thought of CSU, I was still so nervous and wondering was this really about to happen. 

When they offered me the chance to play for CSU, I couldn’t say “Yes” fast enough!

I have been on Cloud 9 ever since and still have to pinch myself to know it’s not a dream. 

I was so blessed and fortunate that my No. 1 program called me right away and I was able to secure my commitment so early in the process.

But everyone’s story is different and their own, so for all of the girls who are still waiting for their call, keep grinding.

Stay the course and keep putting in the work to make yourself better than you were the day before, and stay ready because the call will come. 

— Alex Akins