Milford-Cissna Park’s Addison Lucht excels in softball, track and field

As the era of athletic specialization continues to see countless student-athletes sacrifice multisport experiences to focus on one sport, maybe two, Addison Lucht is spending her spring excelling in more sports than most specialized athletes do in a calendar year.

Lucht, a junior as Cissna Park High School, is a four-sport all-state athlete who is showing no signs of slowing down. The starting shortstop for the softball team and long jump specialist in track and field, both of which are co-op teams at Milford, Lucht is well on her way to becoming an all-state star in multiple spring sports for the third straight year.

The Northwestern softball commit earned Illinois Coaches Association Class 1A All-State recognition her freshman and sophomore years, also placing in the long jump in the IHSA Class 1A State Finals each year. This year, she’s once again on pace to bat over .600 on the diamond and finish among the state’s best long jumpers.

And that’s just half of Lucht’s athletic excellence. In addition to her dual-sport spring, Lucht is a two-time all-state volleyball and three-time all-state basketball player. She earned her second straight Daily Journal Volleyball Player of the Year honor last fall, helping the Timberwolves to back-to-back trips to the Class 1A State Finals.

The Timberwolves also were state qualifiers in basketball, finishing third in Class 1A, with Lucht earning Illinois Basketball Coaches Association All-State honors for the third time and Illinois Media All-State honors for the second time. To date, she’s made the Daily Journal All-Area team in every sport she has played since she started high school, a total of 10 teams and counting.

“Just my love for any sport I’m in, I think that’s what keeps me motivated,” Lucht said. “I love to practice as much as I love to play.

" ... I just love whatever season that we’re in. Every sport, every team has a different chemistry, and even getting new teammates with Milford. I love softball, but I love any sport I’m in at any season.”

While she doesn’t have a particular favorite sport, her attention was drawn to softball when she went from playing youth baseball in Cissna Park to travel softball with the now-defunct House of Sportz.

That’s where she started meeting other athletes in her age group outside of the Cissna Park area, including her House of Sportz teammate and future Northwestern teammate, Bishop McNamara senior Teagan McCue, something that’s continued after she went down to Champaign’s Fastpitch Premier when House of Sportz closed a few years ago.

And it’s also where she first realized softball could help her forge her future path.

“I just love [travel softball],” Lucht said. “I love playing in the summer, competing at a really high level. I knew I’d have some interest going into it because you could tell by the coaches that would come. So I just started putting more focus into that.”

That focus, complete with a net in her basement to work on her swing year round, led her to area batting titles in each of her first two seasons, batting .652 as a freshman and .671 as a sophomore. At the time of print, she’s batting an even .600 with five home runs, 17 extra-base-hits, 32 RBIs, 28 runs and an on-base plus slugging of 2.158 through 16 games, with the Bearcats sitting at 10-6.

“She’s just a really easy player to coach,” Bearcats softball coach Alyse Morefield said. “Not just because she has natural talent, but just the knowledge she has of the game is something that can’t be taught. As a coach, that’s just amazing to see in a player. I can’t teach that in a player, and she’s just developed that through practice and hard work. Her work ethic is amazing.”

On the track, where she’s narrowed her focus from sprinting and long jumping to just the latter, she’s reached a season high of 5.02 meters twice this season, a number that would qualify her for another state appearance.

While she has a few volleyball and basketball teammates from Cissna Park join her with Bearcat softball and track and field, the spring co-ops also provide Lucht, whose warm, friendly personality is as well known around town as her athletic talents, to spread her social wings.

“It’s really cool,” Lucht said. “Obviously, we’re competitors when we play against each other, but just knowing that we’re gonna be teammates eventually, we’re really good friends. I’m thankful for that.”