Susolik thrives at Kenyon
Lindsey Susolik has worn the same wristband for almost two years. The wristband used to be black, but the color has turned to blue from wearing it every day.
The message on the wristband has faded away as well. What has not is the memory of Susolik’s favorite softball coach.
The wristband reminds Susolik of that coach, Barry Jon Grumman, who used to run the Newport Beach Riptide Gold club team. Without Grumman, Susolik said she isn’t playing softball at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. Grumman helped Susolik continue her softball career after she graduated from Corona del Mar High in 2012.
“I had my heart set on Yale, but I didn’t have the grades and test scores,” Susolik said. “Barry told me about Kenyon and referred my name to the softball coach. One of his daughters, [Sasha, a 2006 Newport Harbor graduate], had gone to school there and he said my personality would fit in well in the Midwest because people are down to earth and humble.”
Before Susolik left for Kenyon, an NCAA Division III school in rural Ohio, she had a graduation party in August and Grumman attended. Fourteen months later, Grumman passed away at 62 from a heart attack.
Susolik, a sophomore at the time at Kenyon, flew back for her old coach’s funeral. It was there where she and many of Grumman’s former players paid their respects that she received that wristband. The words on the wristband read “Coach Barry 10/13/13” on one side and “Forever in Our Hearts” on the other side.
Susolik hasn’t taken it off since. The wristband motivates her to do her best, and she has performed at Kenyon.
Susolik is coming off a banner junior season in which she hit .307 with nine home runs and 34 runs batted in. The homers are a Kenyon single-season record and they led the North Coast Athletic Conference last season.
“I really thank him for everything he’s done for me,” Susolik said of Grumman. “Every time I’m home from college, I go visit him and leave a pebble on his grave. It’s a Jewish tradition of leaving a stone or pebble.”
Susolik is in Newport Beach, having arrived on Saturday. She plans to visit Grumman at Pacific View Memorial Park and Mortuary doing her 10-day stay, before she returns to Kenyon.
The last time Susolik had seen Grumman was the summer after her freshman season. She hoped to play for Grumman and his under-18 Riptide Gold team. She was still eligible, but her back didn’t hold up during a practice.
She tried to play in a couple of games. When she limped around, Susolik said, “Barry told me to go home and take care of myself.”
She never saw him again. She said she owed it to Grumman to succeed in softball. Susolik has, earning first-team All-North Coast Athletic Conference honors the past two seasons.
She’s looking forward to her senior year, when Susolik will play first base. Back surgery after her freshman year forced her to stop playing catcher, which she played at CdM, and move to third base, a position she played her first two years at Kenyon. Last year, she was the designated hitter and led Kenyon to a 29-11 overall record, the best win total in the program’s history.
When Susolik’s playing days are over, she wants to become a lawyer. The occupation is the same one her old softball coach practiced for more than 30 years.
“I miss him and I’ll never forget how we used to practice at Ensign [Intermediate School], right across from where he lived,” Susolik said. “He would allow us to use the bathroom at his house during practice, or hang out at his house after practice, if our parents weren’t there yet to pick us up.
“At his funeral, there were so many people there, 90% were softball related. One of his co-workers said that Barry was always talking about softball, about what his players were doing or where they were going to college, and how proud he was of them. I wanted to go back to Kenyon and do everything I could to prove to him that I can do it.”
Whenever Susolik needs to push herself, all she has to do is look down at her left wrist.
