While many girls consider a glitzy ring in a Tiffany-blue box their best friend, members of a new Belmont athletic group are instead spending their time with another diamond – one with red dirt and turf.
After the Belmont Bruins baseball team earned a bid and won two games in the NCAA tournament last year, the newly formed Diamond Girls are looking to build support for the team and to keep fans involved at Rose Park. These 14 women will be responsible for various in-game duties like collecting home and visitor bats and assisting the promotions staff during games.
The idea came from head baseball coach Dave Jarvis, and now athletics graduate assistant Mallory McGough is managing the fledgling organization with student captain Elizabeth Halvorson.
“I feel that the Diamond Girls are an important organization that the baseball team was really in need of, not only for in-game assistance and support, but also to continue to spread the word in the community about the success of Belmont baseball,” McGough said.
The concept behind the Diamond Girls is not unique to Belmont. While many college and minor league baseball teams have similar organizations, the Belmont group’s target is to help make the baseball team and Belmont athletics more recognizable in Nashville and in the NCAA.
Sophomore music business major Brittany Marshall said working for the Diamond Girls was an opportunity to balance out her studies while being involved with Belmont athletics.
“I grew up in a very athletic family—my brother played baseball, my sister played softball, and I played softball, so the baseball environment here brings back a great childhood memory and is really fun to be around,” she said.
As the first on-campus organization of its kind, Diamond Girls want to help start off a baseball tradition at Belmont, Marshall said. At this point, however, transition is now priority over that potential tradition.
“It’s really hard for the guys because they’re not used to us yet,” Marshall said. So, [we’re] telling them ‘leave the bat, let them get it’ and just focusing on those kinds of things.
“I’m excited and I think that it’s a great thing that will hopefully continue through the years. And if this goes well, I’d like to keep going until I graduate through the next three seasons.”