Pitching in her dream
Sementelli plays for U.S. in World Cup
Marti Sementelli wanted to play in the Major Leagues.
Like any young baseball player, as her skills evolved, so did her dreams. Sementelli made her high school team and earned a college scholarship.
The sky was the limit. Now representing the United States in the Women’s World Cup this week, Sementelli’s baseball life is just getting started.
“My dad always wanted a son,” she said. “I was a girl and he was like, ‘You know what, I’ll play with her anyways, see where it takes her.’ ”
Sementelli started by playing indoors with plastic bats and her father throwing to her. It went from something to do for fun to something she wanted to pursue.
“He taught me a pitching windup and that’s what stuck,” she said. “I fell in love with pitching and it took off.”
Born in Newton, Sementelli was raised in California where her baseball skills had the chance to flourish. She quickly became a standout.
Yet, once women baseball players’ high school careers end, often that means so does their playing days. With a scholarship offer from Montreat College in North Carolina, the pitcher kept playing and kept improving. By the time she made the national team, there wasn’t much awareness about how fast the game had grown. Now, she represents a plethora of ballplayers who fought for their chance to play.
“When you’re a kid you want to go to the majors,” she said. “As you get older, reality kicks in. I knew I wanted to play in high school and that was a big goal. Playing college baseball, that happened, and I found out there was a USA women’s national team.”
The big stage is nothing new for Sementelli. She helped win bronze medals in world tournaments while still pitching for Burbank High School, where she was the only girl on the team. She tossed a complete game shutout then that earned her national acclaim, but it was only the start.
Sementelli started playing at five years old, and, like any elite player, as she continued to find success, she found she was a step above. The next step was finding a way to harness that ability.
At Montreat, the coaching staff pressured her to play softball, a sport she had never played. While knowing those skills were valuable, she knew she belonged on the baseball diamond.
She had a chance to prove that soon after. In the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto, she didn’t allow a run in two appearances.
Now a Boston resident, Sementelli keeps active despite the New England seasonal challenges. With the World Cup team selected in June, she was pretty much on her own to prepare.
“I’m the only one in the New England area,” she said. “I pretty much train with my dad or an indoor facility that I work at. All year round you’re doing it on your own. Everyone has their daily lives and work and things like that, so you have to fit it in in-between.”
For Sementelli, the winter months became a challenge.
“I’ve seen the drastic change in weather,” she said. “Luckily, I have a few connections with my family running a boxing facility so on days it’s really cold I can play indoors there.”
The United States opened with double-digit victories over Puerto Rico and the Netherlands. The U.S. is considered tournament favorites among the 12 countries competing in Viera, Fla.
“We’re building momentum for bigger games coming up,” said the 25-yearold Sementelli. “Right now everything is on pace for everything we planned. It’s looking good so far.”