PREP SOFTBALL: Deaton being all she can be at Auburn High

Lauren Deaton has an intimate understanding of what it means to be a “military brat.”

That’s because her father, Brian, has made a career out of convincing tough guys that they might not be quite so tough.

Brian, a captain who first enlisted in the Army in 1991 and served in Operation Iraqi Freedom from 2003-05, runs a training program for aspiring Rangers at Fort Benning.

Those who pass his course, which involves 15 days of intensive physical and mental drills that last an average of 18 to 20 hours a day, move on to Ranger school.

The majority of the candidates who enter his training can’t cut it.

“We teach, coach and mentor them to be successful at school,” Brian said. “We try to determine the best candidates to move forward to Ranger school.

“We have a high attrition rate.”

So Lauren, a senior centerfielder for Auburn High, knows what it means to have a military man as a father: intensity, drive and discipline.

But she also knows that Brian shrugs some of that off when he changes out of his uniform.

“Personality-wise, we’re a lot alike. So we definitely don’t clash,” Lauren said. “The way he runs things, I respect it.

“He doesn’t treat us like he treats his boys. He doesn’t blend his father figure status with his standards he has to meet at the Army.”

Lauren moved from southern Illinois, where she was living with her mother, last March to live with Brian and her stepmother in Auburn.

The senior had originally committed to play college ball at Indiana, but “ended up on a different path,” because she felt she needed more time adjusting to the athletic and academic demands at the major college level.

Lauren signed with Tallahassee Community College in January, where the head coach, Patti Townsend, was a college teammate of Indiana coach Michelle Gardner at Michigan.

Brian said it’s part of his job to get Lauren back where she wants to be, playing softball for the Hoosiers.

“I told her up front that her primary goal was she was going to graduate high school, and her secondary was softball,” Brian said. “She has re-focused on her schoolwork, brought her grades up. If everything works out as planned, she should be right where she wanted to be to start with.”

Lauren joined the Tigers in the middle of last season and finished it strong, hitting .362 and driving in 18 runs.

It was a change that took some getting used to, not only in terms of dealing with some “Southern intricacies,” as Brian said, but in terms of blending in with a whole new group of teammates in a whole new town.

“A lot of people probably thought I had a little bit of a cocky attitude,” Lauren said. “But I think some people are like that when they’re going into a new group, trying to hold their own.

“Nobody wants to be pushed around the first day.”

Chris Spencer, the Tigers’ first-year head coach, was an assistant when Lauren joined the team last year.

He said it didn’t take the then-junior much longer than that first day to fall in with her new team.

“About two practices,” Spencer said of Deaton’s adjustment period. “She was pretty easy to get along with and she knew what her role was coming in as a new player in the middle of the season. She took her role as, ‘I’m here to help. What do you need me to do?’”

This year the Tigers are expecting more from Deaton, just as she’s expecting more from herself.

Playing one of the most crucial positions on the field and hitting in the four hole, Spencer needs Deaton to be a star.

Being one of three seniors on a team that includes eight players who are sophomores or younger, Spencer needs Deaton to shrug off any leftover bashfulness and be assertive, such as the time he saw her stop in the middle of a hitting drill to help fix an error one of the younger players kept making.

Deaton said she hasn’t had much trouble finding her role.

“Jamie (Shirley)’s the brains, Dee (Hall)’s the jokes and, necessarily, sometimes I’m the action,” Deaton said of she and her fellow seniors. “The coaching staff has set the atmosphere for us to keep motivated. With a team full of girls, that’s not always easy.”

Brian, who trades in motivation, doesn’t see that as much of a problem for his daughter.

“She’s self-driven and likes to win,” he said. “Very competitive, type-A personality.

“The fact that she is focused both on academics and athletics this year, and being able to do well in both, I’m very proud of what she’s done and how she’s handled herself.”

dmorrison@oanow.com | 737-2568