Norse hire Heidi Charon to head new softball program
ESCANABA — Bay College noticed that U.P. softball players didn’t want to go too far to play their college ball so they began building a softball program and this week, they have found a person with local ties who will run it.
The Norse have announced that Heidi Charon will be the first–ever head coach of the softball program. She currently works at Bay College in the Academic Support Department as the Retention Program Manager, but now she gets to head the new program.
“I’m just really excited. It’s such a great opportunity for our girls coming up. We have such great talent across the U.P. right now and I’m super excited that these girls will have a chance to stay at home and continue to play softball,” Charon said.
Charon has been entrenched in the local softball scene. She graduated from Escanaba in 2004, playing on the varsity softball team for four years. She moved on to play softball at Michigan State University and returned to Esky to help with the varsity team from 2009 to 2012. She says it’s hard to explain why there is so much softball talent in Delta County.
“I’m not sure, but we definitely have it. I think it’s just been a lot of years in the making. I guess I felt it pick up when me and my teammates were younger back in the early 2000’s and the 1990’s. Since then, it’s just been rolling and it just keeps growing. Every school in this area is as competitive as the next,” said Charon.
The softball program will begin play in the spring of 2019. Bay College is still searching for their first–ever baseball coach as well.