RV’S Williams signs on to play softball at Wilkes University

How River Valley High senior Caylee-mae Williams manages to squeeze everything into a 24-hour day is an accomplishment unto itself.

She’s been known to wake up well before dawn to hit the gym to work out to start her day. She’s been a straight-a student all four years at River Valley along with taking classes at Yuba College. She’s played four different sports for the Falcons while also traveling out of town to play competitive softball, and to top it all off, she serves as the school’s senior class president.

But for Williams, academics has always been the top priority. Her goal is to become a sports physical therapist with an emphasis on psychology, and it’s the main reason why she turned down scholarship offers from a handful of Division I and Division II schools to pursue her education and play softball on the East Coast.

Last week, Williams signed a National Letter of Intent to play collegiately at Wilkes University, a Division-iii school in Wilkes-barre, Pennsylvania, located about two hours north of Philadelphia.

She received the three highest academic

Courtesy photo River Valley High senior Caylee Mae-williams signed a National Letter of Intent to play softball at Wilkes University in Pennsylvania during a ceremony last week at Elite Fitness in Yuba City.

scholarships available, and was recently accepted into the school’s honors program. Williams will major in neuroscience and minor in psychology at Wilkes, and will go through the school’s pre-physical therapy program while also playing softball for the Colonels.

“I’m looking to be a physical therapist and tie in the psychology part of athletics in with that. When someone gets injured, it’s hard to recover mentally just as hard as it is to recover physically, and I want to help athletes with that,” Williams said.

“Academics is very important to me, and that’s why I chose Wilkes. Their academic program is very prestigious. The Division I and II schools wanted me to change my major. Wilkes is Division III, but they wanted me to pursue my academic dreams and continue my softball career.”

Williams has had a busy schedule since going to River Valley, where she has maintained a 4.0 to 4.33 GPA all four years. She competed in volleyball and softball her freshman year, and ran cross country and played softball her sophomore year before concentrating solely on softball as a junior. This year, she ran cross country in the fall and is currently doing double-duty by competing for the Falcons’ swim and softball teams.

She’s played competitive softball for the last five years, and got her big break while