Ava Drehs had recently moved from Aurora to Naperville when she and her father, Wayne, started exploring their new environs.
She was about to begin first grade when she first saw Neuqua Valley.
“I had just started softball, so I wanted to see the schools,” Drehs said. “Me and my dad drove past the Neuqua fields, and it was like, ‘Oh, look at the awesome softball field.’
“I thought, ‘Wow, if I could play softball for Neuqua, that would be amazing. It would be so cool if I could even make the varsity team one day.’”
Drehs not only made the varsity team. She made history.
“She’s amazing,” Neuqua Valley coach Danielle Asquini said. “She’s just gotten better every school year, and you can see that in her stats and the success that she’s had.
“It’s been amazing to watch her, and we’re definitely going to miss it.”
Drehs, the 2025 Naperville Sun Softball Player of the Year, was better than ever this season. The senior pitcher went 16-6 with a 1.54 earned-run average and a 0.87 WHIP for the DuPage Valley Conference co-champion Wildcats (17-15, 12-3).
In 154 1/3 innings, Drehs struck out 278 and walked just 27. The Creighton recruit broke her single-season program record for strikeouts and also set the career strikeout mark with 670.
Those records had been held by Hannah Meeks, who was the player of the year in 2021 and 2022 and pitches at Illinois State.
“She was super talented, and when she was a senior, I was a freshman, so I always looked up to her,” Drehs said. “So to be able to know that I competed with the records that she held means a lot.”
Drehs, the conference pitcher of the year and an all-state second-team pick, competed hard every time she played, never easing up.
“Ava is always ready to go and up for a challenge,” Asquini said. “Even in relief, she’s warmed up and ready. We can exchange a glance and know that her time might be coming.
“She is so excited, so hyped up every single time she’s stepping in the circle.”
Drehs didn’t only overpower hitters. She also outsmarted them.
“Something that’s really special about Ava is that she’s constantly adjusting,” Neuqua Valley senior catcher Krista Waldusky said. “So if she sees they’re gonna chase that outside pitch, then she’s like, ‘I’m gonna push them further and further and further off the plate. I’m not gonna give them a good pitch to swing at because I know that they’re gonna chase it.’
“If the first rise ball doesn’t really break as much as she’d like it to, the next one will. She is constantly making those adjustments to make herself the hardest pitcher to hit.”
Drehs did it with pinpoint control. She never walked more than two batters in any outing, so if she got ahead in the count, hitters always seemed to chase.
Drehs is always chasing greatness by thinking ahead.
“This year, one big example of that is in our regional semifinal game against Oswego East,” she said. “We won, but I wasn’t really proud of the way I pitched. I feel like they were making a lot of contact, and I wasn’t too happy about it
“So before our next game, I talked to coach, and we figured out some adjustments. When I brought that to Krista, I said, ‘Look, I think we should try this.’”
Drehs broke out a two-seam fastball and pitched a six-hitter with no earned runs in the Wildcats’ 6-0 loss to Oswego, which won the state title on June 14.
“I had seven strikeouts, and five of them were on that new pitch,” Drehs said. “So we’re constantly adjusting what we’re doing. It’s never the same.”
Indeed, Drehs is never standing still. She knows she will have to improve at Creighton, and Asquini doesn’t doubt she will.
“As she gets older, I think she’s going to get stronger,” Asquini said. “That’s what she wants, and when someone is as motivated as she is, there’s really no stopping her at that point.”
Drehs will major in elementary education and wants to return to Naperville as a first grade teacher.
It would be a full-circle moment for someone who may already have inspired someone who could try to break her records. Drehs’ sister Zoe, who will begin sixth grade in the fall, plays softball and soccer.
“I’m so excited,” Drehs said. “I’ve always wanted to be a teacher. I have a little sister who is seven years younger than me, and I used to prop her up on chairs and teach her like we were in school.”
Matt Le Cren is a freelance reporter.