Friendly battle underway for slugging supremacy

By Jason Brummond, Correspondent

CEDAR RAPIDS - A home run chase compares like no other spectacle on the diamond. It's captivating. It's enchanting.

This one is right in our backyard.

Mount Mercy softball sluggers Jessica Magnuson and Liz Hill continue to trade turns on top of the school's all-time home run list this season. Both passed the two-decade-old record this spring.

And they're only juniors.

“They're cheering for each other,” Mount Mercy co-head coach Larry Yoder said. “I think they're having fun with it. They're each other's biggest fans.”

Magnuson's home run Thursday against Saint Ambrose put her in a 22-22 tie for career homers with Hill, who set the school's season homer record with 11 in 2010 before Magnuson bested that this year.

Magnuson has 13 home runs this season, Hill nine.

Kim Hutchins, a former Marion prep, held the school's career mark with 16 home runs (1989-92). Magnuson broke that record March 27 against Ashford, and since then she and Hill have gone back and forth.

“That's the best part of the whole thing,” Hill said. “It's a competition in a way, but we're still very supportive and encouraging of each other.”

Magnuson and Hill share a lot off the field. Both are team captains and education majors who share a couple of the same courses.

Both will be high school head coaches this summer. Same conference, too. Magnuson will lead West Central in Maynard. Hill will be in the dugout for Lansing Kee.

Their paths here couldn't be any different.

Magnuson, a slugger at Waterloo East, played a season at Northern Iowa before tearing the ACL in her right knee, repeating a high school injury. The third baseman decided to transfer, and Mount Mercy was close enough to home.

Hill wasn't always the prolific slugger she's become. The Shellsburg native hit only one home run before joining the Mustangs. That quickly changed.

Hill worked tirelessly on her swing and in the weight room - and watching video.

“We thought she had a lot of potential, but we didn't know it would be like this,” Yoder said. “She's without a doubt the hardest worker I've ever coached.”

For the Mustangs, who are 22-23 after Saturday's 3-2 loss to Iowa Wesleyan in the Midwest Collegiate Conference tournament, this may just be the start of big things. The entire team returns next year.

The Mustangs play in an elimination game Sunday morning.