After 15 seasons with the program, that has included participation in all eight Women’s Baseball World Cups and the 2015 Pan American Games, Kate Psota and Ashley Stephenson are retiring as players from the Women’s National Team.
After 15 seasons with the program, that has included participation in all eight Women’s Baseball World Cups and the 2015 Pan American Games, Kate Psota and Ashley Stephenson are retiring as players from the Women’s National Team.
Psota, 32, and Stephenson, 36, end their playing careers as the most decorated female athletes to wear a Canadian national team uniform having captured a Pan Am Games silver medal in 2015 along with WBSC Women’s Baseball World Cup silver medals in 2008 and 2016, and bronze medals in 2004, 2006, 2012 and 2018.
In what will go down as their last game played with the Women’s National Team, Psota and Stephenson went out on a winning note after a thrilling, extra-innings, 8-5, win over the United States last August in Viera, Florida to win a women’s baseball world cup bronze medal.
“I love playing baseball and will definitely miss the feeling of competing in big games but there comes a time in every athlete’s career when it’s best to move on to new opportunities,” said Stephenson. “This was the right time for me to close one door and look forward to new adventures and challenges that are ahead.”
Last October, Stephenson was elected a member of the WBSC Athletes Commission and appointed on the WBSC Baseball Division Board as a result.
Ashley Stephenson during the WBSC Women’s Baseball World Cup 2018
“I think deep down I knew (I’d retire) in Florida, but the last few months solidified it for me,” said Psota. “The decision wasn’t easy, but it’s the right time and certainly a mix of emotions after being part of the program for 15 years.”
The retirement represents a changing of the guard so to speak with the Women’s National Team program following the retirement of veteran Nicole Luchanksi following last year’s world cup while the only field manager the program has ever know, André Lachance, will be transitioning into a general manger’s role with Aaron Myette moving to manager from pitching coach.
Lachance and Myette will not be the only changes on the Canadian coaching staff as Stephenson has accepted a coaching role that will see her move to other side of the game with the Women’s National Team program.