Following their win over Northampton in last week’s East Penn Conference softball championship, the Parkland seniors were summoned to receive the championship trophy near home plate at Patriots Park in Allentown.

Normally, the players quickly flock to the presentation and look to get their hands on the prize immediately. For the Lady Trojans though, there was an absolute pause when they realized that one of their players was missing and they refused to accept the trophy until Katie Gontkosky joined the group.

The crutches and knee brace that Gontkosky has needed since early April slowed her down, but they were going nowhere until she arrived. Gontkosky injured her knee in the first game of the season, and it cost the Parkland first baseman her senior season as a player, but not as a part of the Parkland team.

In a nonconference game against Abington Heights, Gontkosky hit a ground ball and took an awkward step out of the batter’s box. She hobbled on one leg a couple of times before going down to the ground. After the play was completed, the Parkland trainer and head coach Barry Search got to Gontkosky. As she was helped from the field, there was obvious concern on the faces of everyone involved.

The future Elon University student may have lost her senior season in the season-opening loss to Abington and had to go through plenty of frustrations because of the injury, but she never lost her standing with the team.

“There have been ups and downs, good days and bad days,” said Gontkosky. “My teammates always outweigh the downs though and they always bring me back in. We always cheer each other up and we are always by each other’s side. No matter what happens, we always come back and prove ourselves.”

While Gontkosky credits her teammates with keeping her spirits up and not letting her become disconnected from the team, Search believes that she was never in jeopardy of losing her real position with him or her teammates.

“That young lady is a leader. She is an absolute joy,” said Search. “Her enthusiasm and her being on the bench with the kids is having another coach and it’s a coach that can communicate with them in their terms. Where most kids would be sulking and asking why it happened to them, she has been an absolute joy. She does everything she can to help everybody, and she is going to be a successful young lady.”

Because of COVID and the injury, Gontkosky only had one full season of varsity softball and she finishes her high school career with a .286 average and was a strong presence at first base of the Lady Trojans. The task of filling Gontkosky’s bat and glove fell on junior Brenna Zavecz, who picked up an RBI single in the win over Northampton. The victory gave Parkland its first conference title since 2019 after COVID cost the Trojans a chance to repeat in 2020 and Freedom cost them championships in back-to-back seasons in 2021.

“Everybody rallied around her (Zavecz) and helped her prepare and to take over,” said Gontkosky. “We all give everything we can to the success of the team and Brenna was no different.”

Parkland continues to play on in districts and Gontkosky, in her new role as a pseudo coach, will be right there. Her coach and teammates never look at her as being along for the ride. Instead, she is just playing a different role in getting the team to their sixth District 11 championship in eight seasons.

“There is a magic with this team,” said the future business analytics major with a broad smile and a gold medal around her neck. “There is also a true sense of camaraderie that goes along with being on this team.”