Oak Park’s homecoming queen is also quite striking on soccer field

MICHAEL COONS/The Acorn Oak Park's Ashley Walsh

Ashley Walsh plays center midfield for the Oak Park Eagles girls’ soccer team, currently in first place in the Tri-Valley League with a record of 4-0 beginning this week (13-3 overall) as it attempts to win a third straight league championship.

Walsh was homecoming queen at Oak Park this fall and her boyfriend, Dustin Baxley, a star on the Oak Park football team, joined her as the homecoming king.

Walsh possesses a 3.9 grade-point-average (GPA) as she heads toward the homestretch of her senior year of high school, and this year, her GPA is 4.1.

Standing 4-foot-10 and ¼ inch, Walsh continues to reach new heights both on the field and in the classroom, and she’s hoping the Eagles make a serious run at a California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) championship in girls’ soccer this winter.

"Every year that I’ve played for Oak Park, we’ve been incredibly hopeful for CIF," Walsh said from her home last Sunday afternoon. "We’ve had a dream of aspiring to get there, and our coach has even promised us that if we make it to the finals, he’ll buy us all CIF rings."

Ted Eggleston’s Oak Park contingent is shooting for a second straight undefeated league season. Walsh, in her third year playing varsity for the Eagles after transferring from a varsity role at Paraclete in her freshman year, is a key component.

"Ashley is like a center linebacker in that she keeps the play in front of her," Eggleston said. "She doesn’t allow the ball to advance to our defensive third of the field. Instead, she sets the ball up in our offensive third for our goals scorers."

Amy Poyer and Allison Bernstein, co-captains with Walsh, and Courtney Crane, are frequent recipients of Walsh’s playmaking.

"I would rather assist the pass than score the goal because it feels good to make other people look good and be good," said Walsh. "We’re a pretty unselfish team. We work well and pull together, and we realize that we need to use each other in order to win the game."

Walsh’s adjustment to Oak Park happened quicker than she expected. And from the beginning—her sophomore year—she was a role model for her teammates.

"I lived in Palmdale, the Antelope Valley," she said. "It was two completely different worlds when I moved here and I expected the transition to be really difficult. But Ted (coach Eggleston) and the team welcomed me right away, and I seemed to automatically have a leadership role."

After being voted by the players for the past two years as "Most Inspirational Player," the Eagles now take their cue, in large part, from Walsh’s lead.

"In order for our team to be successful, somebody needs to take charge," Walsh said. "It just so happens that I play center midfielder, which means I’m right in the middle of everything happening. I can be a part of every single play."

To provide the inspiration and motivation expected of her, Walsh pulls no punches.

"It sounds bad, but my concern is that everybody keeps their head in the game, and if I need to be brutally honest, I’ll be brutally honest. But everybody understands that I do it for the benefit of the team."

Walsh long ago learned to use her stature as incentive to show that she is capable of doing anything a girl, say, 5-foot-10 and ¼, can do.

"Since I began playing soccer, I’ve had coaches who told me, ‘You’re really good, you’re awesome, but you’ll never make it because of your height, because you’re just too small.’"

Walsh’s consistent response has been to prove she could play with anyone, no matter how tall or how big.

"It’s been able to fuel my desire," she said of assertions that she’s too small. "Now, I don’t see a difference between a girl who’s 5-foot or 6-foot. They’re all the same to me. I’ve always been small and I use it to my advantage because people underestimate my ability."

Last year, Oak Park lost in the CIF quarterfinals. Walsh thinks this may be the year the Eagles break through and advance deep into the postseason.

"This is the best Oak Park team I’ve ever seen," she said. "If we play to our potential, we have a really good chance in CIF this year."