Former All-American Kyleigh Payne enters her first season as a Lincoln Memorial University softball graduate assistant with a wealth of experience and success.
Payne, a Bourbonnais, Ill., native wrapped up her impressive collegiate career at Purdue University Northwest — where she played under LMU head coach Ritchie Richardson and assistant Travis Hill for one year in 2017 before the duo came to Harrogate — as the 2018 Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) Softball Player of the Year. She was then later tabbed a NCAA Division II National Fastpitch Coaches Association Third Team All-America selection.
In her second and final season with the Pride, Payne started all 52 games and helped pace PNW to a fourth-place conference finish in its first season as a member of the GLIAC. Her season spoke to why she was tabbed POY as she led the conference with a .440 batting average, 62 hits, nine triples, a .549 on-base percentage and a .851 slugging percentage. Payne also ranked second in the GLIAC with 10 home runs and third in RBI (39).
Before transferring to PNW, Payne jumpstarted her career at Kankakee Community College (Ill.), where she assisted in leading the Cavaliers to a NJCAA National Championship as a freshman. Payne's success on the field started early in life as she was also a multi-letter winner at Bishop McNamara Catholic and capped off her high school career the best way possible with a state championship.
After earning a bachelor's degree in sociology from PNW in 2018, Payne spent a year as a graduate assistant at Wheeling Jesuit before heading South to reunite with Richardson and Hill while pursuing her MBA and coaching the sport she thrived in all her life.
