Jessica Strauch has taken her softball career from the playing field for LaSalle-Peru to the dugout for the Cavaliers and as a travel coach.

Her next step takes her to Princeton High School to become the Tigresses head softball coach. She was hired at Wednesday’s board of education meeting.

Strauch, 33, was ready to move on from the travel softball ranks and learned from one of her travel players from Princeton, Reese Reviglio, that the Princeton job was open and it peaked her interest.

“I was wrapping up my Aftershock 16U and I wasn’t fully ready to give up my coaching yet,” she said. “I loved being a head coach. I love making the decisions. That’s something I’m really passionate about. Teaching girls not only softball but life lessons. You learn a lot of life skills through softball.

“Princeton is very community based. I run a State Farm office and I’m very community based so it’s really awesome to have this second opportunity to get involved in a community just as much as I can with my insurance office. I really love the aspect of one family, one community and that’s what Princeton had to offer that I was attracted to.”

The former Cavaliers catcher was an assistant coach at L-P for eight years, where she worked with all aspects and levels of the game.

Strauch, an insurance agent for State Farm in Peru, has served both an assistant coach for four years and the head coach for the last two years of the Illinois Valley Aftershock Travel 16U softball team and was previously an assistant coach at Putnam County Junior High.

Athletic director Jeff Ohlson said Strauch comes to PHS with a wealth of high school softball experience, which will benefit the program.

“We’re very excited to bring Coach Strauch on board to lead our softball program,” he said. “Her experience playing and coaching in a quality and successful program at L-P and her time coaching in travel softball along with her excitement and love for softball make her an outstanding leader for our student-athlete softball players.

“We look forward to the excitement she will bring leading our softball program.”

Strauch said she has learned a lot from her coaching experiences, noting that it’s completely different than being a player.

“Being a player is super, super easy on the aspect of you go to the game, you go to practice and do the best you can. Once practice is done, you’re good,” she said. “Coaching is always constant. You’re always thinking about ways to better just not yourself but you’re trying to better a team.

“I definitely learned how to adapt. Every player is different. Every age group is different. I’m not going to teach the same thing to a 6-year-old as I am a high schooler. So there’s definitely been a lot of adaptation. Being a player and learning the lingo is one thing. Being a coach you have to be able to simplify a lot of terms. Find different ways to coach girls which is something I enjoy.”

She joked that being a coach is “definitely less painful,” because she doesn’t have to ice her knees like when she was a catcher.

Strauch will be the 10th varsity coach in program history, following Jhavon Hayes, who resigned after three seasons to become hitting coach at Illinois State University, her alma mater.

Kim Hubble was the first coach of the program when it started in 1992, coaching for three seasons. She was followed by Eric Tinley (1995), Cheryl Miller (1996-02), Sara Larkin (2003-07), Bob James (2008-15), Alyssa Rose (2016-17), Brik Wedekind (2018), Joe Bates (2019-22) and Hayes (2023-25).