Down under with the underhand throw

By NATE HUBBARD/Staff

Sports have taken Tyler Pruett from Bastian to Bluefield to Brisbane.
Brisbane, Australia, that is.
Pruett, 24, a 2003 graduate of Rocky Gap High School who still resides in Grapefield, spent two weeks Down Under in June as an assistant coach with a USA Athletes International softball squad.
The USAAI organization gives amateur athletes the opportunity to travel and learn about other cultures, while also taking part in international sporting competitions.
Pruett, the head softball coach at Bluefield State, his alma mater, got the opportunity to go on the trip through his connections with the USAAI team’s head coach, Todd Buckingham.
Buckingham, now the head softball coach at a college in Indiana, was a Bland County Bears assistant basketball coach during Pruett’s senior year.
Pruett, while still a college student, also later served as Buckingham’s assistant coach during Buckingham’s tenure as Bluefield State’s head softball coach.
Buckingham and Pruett took 14 college and incoming college softball players to Australia for the June games.
While the trip was more about the overall experience than cutthroat competition, the U.S. team faced some formidable opponents.
“We actually played the Chinese Taipei Olympic team,” Pruett said.
The U.S. squad, which was made up of players from around the country, also faced teams made up of players under consideration for the Australian national team as well other Australian club softball squads, often with veteran players in their late 20s and early 30s.
The venue for the matchup against the Chinese Taipei team was another highlight of the experience, Pruett said, as the teams faced off in the main stadium in Sydney where the 2000 Olympic softball competition was held.
Overall, Pruett said his team did well, finishing its trip with a record of three wins, two losses and a tie.
Pruett played in the outfield as a high school baseball player in Bland County and said his role as a coach for the USAAI team was to work with that part of the softball squad.
“My big thing was to keep them upbeat the whole time and work with the outfield unit,” he said.
Although the team got serious on the field, Pruett said wins and losses didn’t define the trip, which for him was his first outside of the United States.
“We didn’t belittle them or throw a fit if we lost,” Pruett said.
With most of the games played as part of doubleheaders, the players and coaches had plenty of time to sightsee.
“We had three days of work and the rest was vacation,” he said.
The team flew into Brisbane and spent time there before heading to Sydney where they got to see attractions such as the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge.
Pruett said many of the softball players also tried out surfing – he declined, seeing as it rained almost their entire stay and it was winter in Australia – and the team also visited a zoo where they saw kangaroos and koalas.
Overall, Pruett said the Australian lifestyle wasn’t too different from that in America, although he said people tended to be at little less mannerly than folks from Southwest Virginia.
He said his biggest surprise, though, came when he visited an Australian McDonald’s and asked to have his drink replenished.
“They don’t believe in free refills,” he said with a laugh.
But at the softball complex, Pruett said the team got the star treatment.
The U.S. national team has long dominated world softball competitions and although the USAAI team was just made up of college players, Pruett said the squad was revered by the fans and opposing teams in Australia.
“You’d have thought that we were celebrities,” Pruett said, citing numerous autograph and photo requests.
Pruett, who is assisted with coaching the Bluefield State team by his older brother, Bradley, said he plans to return to Australia again next summer with the 2010 USAAI team.
Next year, the team is scheduled to visit two other cities in Australia, Melbourne and a to-be-determined second spot.
Nate Hubbard can be reached at 1-800-655-1406 or .