GREENSBORO – She had just made an error, so naturally she was nervous.

But true to the axiom that “big-time players make big-time plays in big-time games”, Lauren Dunlow gathered herself, gobbled up a short fly-ball from the next batter, and with a force-out helped preserve a no-hitter for her North Carolina A&T State University softball team.

Big-time.

“I knew we were going to win, but with a no-hitter on the line, I just didn’t want to mess up,” the Askewville native says over the telephone.

The 9-0 win over South Carolina State back in March was one of the first Mideastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) conference games for Dunlow, and a huge step up from her days on the diamond for Bertie High School, from which she graduated with honors in 2015.

Now having just completed her freshman year with the Lady Aggies, Dunlow is still in Greensboro using the summer both to work out and the catch up on school.

Despite the rigors of NCAA Division-I athletics, Dunlow still made the academic Dean’s List during the Spring 2016 semester.  She changed her major after the first semester in the fall from Engineering to Pre-Law, perhaps for a more simplified collegiate curriculum track.  Even after doing so well this last semester, she admits she has some making up to do to reverse the damage she did to her grade-point-average first semester, so she is taking some summer classes.  But she’s got herself back on a track she’s happy with.

“The traveling wasn’t so bad,” she admits. “You’re assigned to do certain things when (the team goes) on the road, so the biggest part was remembering what you had to take care of.  I was used to the travel because of playing travel ball before college.”

Though not as touted on a squad made up of 10 freshmen, three seniors, along with a single junior and sophomore, Dunlow quickly established herself and was the only player to appear in all 49 of A&T’s games, all as a starter.

“A lot of the other coaches of the team we played said if we weren’t so young we might have done better,” Dunlow estimates. “They think that down the road we’re going to be a force to be reckoned with.  Everyone just hopes that now that we’re sophomores we can stay together.”

She led the team in sacrifice bunts and was second in walks although her batting average (.185) suffered because of these two things.  Defensively she accounted for 80 putouts and 81 assists and led the team in fielding double plays.

The NC A&T Softball team traveled a lot this year, playing tournaments in New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, Savannah, and Florida.  The Lady Aggies’ schedule took the team up-and-down the east coast from Delaware to Florida, but Dunlow says the team found ways to occupy themselves away from the field and the books.

“We would sing karaoke on the bus,” she says with a chuckle.  “There were times it was tiring and stressful, but it was still fun.”

Despite a 17-32 record, A&T made it into the MEAC Conference Tournament in Daytona, FL before they were eliminated in two games.  They are coached by Kenya Peters who is in just her third year as head coach, but is used to the patience needed for re-building.

Dunlow says she will work on building power and range, and gaining more speed. “They change you so much when you get to college ball,” Dunlow relates. “My swing changed completely from what it was in high school and travel ball.  My advice to the freshmen next year is going to be getting in as much extra work as possible.  Come out to the field, even when you’re not scheduled.”

Dunlow is back in travel ball for the summer, playing with a small team based out of Gates County.  She’s back in Greensboro also for school and will be helping with a softball camp at NC A&T on June 10 and July 18.  She hopes to make it back to Bertie County on the weekends.

“My summers still revolve around softball,” she says with a contented sigh.