Former South County Ace Chelsey Dunham Starring at Yale

The pitch looks like it’s about to hit you square in the hands. You jump back off the plate to avoid being hit, but at the last moment the ball makes a Strasburg-esque change of direction- mischievously breaking right back over the plate.  You’ve just been victimized by Chelsey Dunham’s screwball- a go-to pitch that helped her strike out 1,007 batters in just 577 innings during her career at South County High School, while compiling a mind-boggling career ERA of .19 en route to a spot on the Yale University Softball team.

Dunham, now a freshman pitcher at Yale who was recently named the Ivy League Rookie of the Week after fanning 24 batters across four wins in one week, is not your ordinary, one-dimensional flamethrower.  In fact, she hasn’t thrown a fastball since she was 12 years old; her 4.4 GPA at South County was even more impressive than her .19 ERA; and she has never noticed the fear in the eyes of the batters she faces.

“I always focus on the catcher’s glove,” she says.  “I never even look at the batters. I just go out and pitch.”

She was practically unhittable at South County.  She posted a 77-9 record with 44 shutouts and 10 no-hitters and was voted the top player in the state in 2010. And yet, there were times in high school when just going out and pitching inspired digs from the boys at her school.

“I was challenged by a lot of guys in high school,” she says. “They’d trash talk, saying stuff like, ‘I don’t know why the girls can’t hit you, and stuff like that,’ and I’d always tell them, meet me after practice and I’ll let you take a few cuts. But no one ever showed up, so I’m guessing they got too scared.”

As a freshman, Dunham has already made an impact on the Yale squad, and the guys are smart enough not to get near her screwball. She’s already notched 10 of the team’s 14 wins, while posting a team best 2.99 ERA. Despite the heady stats, Dunham is as humble as can be, and has no problem with the Yale tradition of making freshman carry the team’s equipment.  

“My job is to carry our batting nets,” she says earnestly, as though she considers the task to be just as important as striking out batters.

The daughter of a retired military officer, Dunham was born in Kansas, and played on her first softball team in Oklahoma before the family settled in Lorton, just prior to her 1st grade year. Her parents have no idea where she got her golden arm from- there are no baseball or softball players in the family, though her parents wield a mean shovel.

Dunham’s journey to New Haven started on a blustery day in February during the infamous blizzard of 2010.

“My husband and I were out shoveling like three feet of snow, and she came running out to tell us that she’d gotten into Yale,” recalls her mother, Shirley Dunham. “And there were other neighbors out shoveling too, so we yelled out the news to them…We wanted to go out and celebrate, but with all the snow, I don’t think we ended up going anywhere.”

She’s known for her pitching, but in reality, softball has always been just a diversion. In high school, Dunham did volunteer work the Lorton Food Bank, tutored students in math and science, and was involved in charity work with her church. A self described “math nerd,” Dunham majors in biomechanical engineering, and hopes to one day help create improved technology for pacemakers.

“My dad has a heart condition called atrial fibrillation, he wears a pacemaker and he’s had like six heart surgeries so I’ve always wanted to find something better for him,” she says.

Dunham could probably play professional softball after college, but she has grander ambitions in mind. Just like her trademark pitch, she’s full of surprises.