- Jocile Norman of Salem Hills throws a no-hitter against Maple Mountain in a Region 7 softball game on Tuesday, April 22, 2025.
Brandon C. Gurney, Daily Herald
Jocile Norman of Salem Hills throws a no-hitter against Maple Mountain in a Region 7 softball game on Tuesday, April 22, 2025.
The knee braces are finally off and Salem Hills junior Jocile Norman is thriving.
Norman dealt a no-hitter on Tuesday in the Skyhawks’ big 4-0 win over Region 7 rival Maple Mountain. It’s a singular accomplishment for any pitcher although Norman took the accomplishment in stride, preferring to focus on her team’s accomplishment.
“I would be nothing without them,” Norman said. “They really have my back and we just all really love each other. We all hang out and it’s just a fun time together. The team chemistry is great.”
But it’s hard to overlook what Norman did individually on Tuesday considering the venue, not to mention what she’s overcome along the way.
Born with knee issues that have plagued her tremendously since the age of 12, Norman has worked ardently to get past all of it.
“I was born with what’s called patella instability,” Norman explained. “So for my first two years of high school I was out for three months. It’s not fun watching from behind the scenes. It’s not fun at all.”
Indeed Norman’s contributions were necessarily limited during both her freshman and sophomore years, leading up to this season where she’s proven more and more dominant with every outing. So much so that Tuesday’s no-hit effort was just sort of shrugged off as somewhat expected.
“She’s just right there with no-hitters a lot,” said Salem Hills coach Kaleb Stokes. “She’ll give up just two hits, or just three, and as the season has gone on she’s just gotten better and sharper. It’s a tough battle when you get into the box against her.”
Extremely tough, as it were.
In Tuesday’s win, Norman struck out nine batters and issued zero bases-on-balls. The Golden Eagles only managed to get a runner on the base in the bottom of the seventh inning due to an error, which Norman dutifully pitched herself out of by retiring the next two battles for the complete game no-hit effort.
“Jo (Norman) is a special talent. She really is,” Stokes said. “She throws hard. She spins the ball, and today she had each one of her pitches working. Wherever we located she hit that spot, and if she didn’t, it was dang close.”
As mentioned, Norman has only been able to reach this point after enduring some arduous rehab efforts over the past six years.
“I think I was around 12 years old when I dislocated my knee cap and I had to wear braces for six years,” Norman related. “Then I finally got surgery, and I don’t have any knee braces and it’s all good. I feel totally healthy.”
Beyond Norman
Success is all but assured when a softball team’s pitcher is tossing a no-hitter, but it often obscures what’s going on around that effort. On Tuesday, Norman’s surrounding defense caught several hard-hit balls, deftly fielded ground balls while giving her an early lead to work with from the plate.
Leading things off was Emmery Wilson hitting a towering solo home run in the first inning and following it up with an RBI single in the fifth. Also adding to the run total in the fifth was Naihlee Simpson lacing a double and then scoring by stealing home two batters later. Helping things along was Camryn Guest laying down a perfect bunt single to advance Simpson to third base.
All in all it’s what Stokes has become accustomed to with this year’s team.
“Our three, four and five hitters are our big hitters and we stack a lot of speed around them,” Stokes said. “But one through nine we’re a really strong lineup. There’s not many coaches who are able to say we’ll pitch around that one or this one in our lineup, so it’s been great for us.”
As for the so-called little things, such as Guest’s bunt single and Simpson stealing home, those are facets Stokes has focused on throughout the season.
“We preach the little things at practice,” Stokes said. “That’s our focus in every single practice because it’s the little things that give us an extra base, and then we’re able to score. So we need those things mastered.”
Salem Hills presents a relatively young squad that was thrown into the fire early last season and summarily benefitted big from that experience this year. It’s helped form a mentally-tough team that is deep and ready to pick one another up on a consistent basis.
“Last year we started five freshmen and now they’re sophomores, and they’re not scared of the big moment,” Stokes stated. “They want that opportunity to get up in those moments because they all believe in each other. This is a team that stays calm and collected when pressure situations hit.”
With Tuesday’s win, the Skyhawks improve to 20-2 on the season with just four games remaining until the state playoffs. And should Norman continue her dominance from inside the pitching circle, with her teammates continuing their solid play around her, big things can easily be anticipated.
