Before practice, freshman Lovena Chaput talks nervously with an Oregon sports information director and teammate Beth Boskovich about how she is a bit apprehensive about doing a television interview.
“I’m not ready for this,” said the
19-year-old Tualatin native, who leads the softball team in hitting during conference play with a .368 average. “I’ve never done one of these before.”
Boskovich tells her with a smile, “You’ve got three more years so you might as well get used to it.”
Oregon’s starting left fielder and leadoff hitter rolls her eyes.
Chaput, who head coach Kathy Arendsen said is fearless and will take on any challenge, sneaks into the dugout as if to avoid the cameraman, but returns shortly after and conducts the interview.
Much like how she approaches the game she loves, Chaput stared adversity in the face and came through with a clutch performance.
“Lovena has some inner strengths, and we recognized some and didn’t know about others,” the third-year coach said. “She handles adversity better than most young players … She is not intimidated. She is not overly impressed. She’s respectful and has good confidence.”
And with good reason.
The left-handed hitting Chaput has already been named player of the week in arguably the toughest conference in the nation. She leads the team this season in hits (37), runs (20), doubles (8) and total bases (61), while sharing the team lead in home runs (4) and triples (2).
Fellow freshman teammate Alicia Cook said Chaput’s production at the plate is amazing for her age.
“She’s definitely not playing like a freshman,” Cook said. “She plays like she has been here forever. She consistently hits the ball … In a game where we walk away with only two or three hits, it’s a pretty safe bet that she has one of them.”
The one aspect of Chaput’s hitting approach Arendsen enjoys is her ability to adjust at the plate.
“She can take a bad swing at a bad pitch and be able to adjust in that at-bat and get a base hit,” Arendsen said. “She is a very
competitive woman.”
Not only have pitchers enjoyed her production at the plate, but so have those that hit behind her. Boskovich, the Ducks’ No. 3 hitter, said that having a hitter like Chaput hitting a few spots ahead of her is a luxury.
“It’s always nice to have your leadoff batter get on base all the time,” Boskovich said. “And when she gets on second or third half the time, it’s nice because you don’t have to waste a
sacrifice bunt.”
While Chaput may be gaining notoriety around Eugene for her hitting, many don’t know that she was actually born to Grant and Lovena just down the road from the University at Sacred Heart Medical Center.
Why the same name as her mother?
“I didn’t have a name for two days, and I was going to be named after my grandma, but they couldn’t figure a middle name out (to go with it),” Chaput said. “So they just named me after my mom.”
Chaput has a 23-year-old brother — coincidentally named after her father — who is a graduate student in Austria.
“I talk to him through e-mail every once in a while, and he came home in February and got to catch a few games,” she said. “I don’t get to talk to him very much, so that is sad.”
But her brother and the rest of her family have caught plenty of Chaput’s games since she started playing at eight years old.
She played Amateur Softball
Association of America ball during the summers to sharpen her skills and eventually earned herself a spot on Tualatin High School’s varsity softball team as a freshman. While she enjoyed individual success throughout her high school career, it wasn’t until her senior year that Tualatin would advance in the state playoffs. Led by Chaput’s .469 average, the Timberwolves advanced to the state title game, where they lost to Westview.
But during that time, the 5-foot-9 Chaput had caught the eye
of Arendsen.
“The first time I saw her play she was going to be a junior in high school and was pretty raw,” Arendsen said. “We saw her a year later, and we thought, ‘Wow!’ She just seemed to get better every weekend.”
For Chaput — who was recruited by schools all over the country — Arendsen’s interest, the ability to stay close to home and play in the Pacific-10 Conference made Oregon an easy choice.
“When I got home from a tournament (on the first day coaches can contact recruits), the first message on my answering machine was from Kathy,” Chaput said. “So that was like ‘Whoa, that’s neat!’”
Since then, Chaput hasn’t hesitated to take on any challenges, from earning a starting spot in the outfield to hitting leadoff.
Even getting interviewed in front of the bright lights of a camera.
