Instructors

Two-time Summit League tournament MVP and 2013 Pitcher of the Year Whitney Johnson enjoyed a record-setting career for North Dakota State University. She ended her career as the Summit League’s all-time leader with 994 strikeouts. She was the Bison all-time leader in appearances (153), games started (131) and inning pitched (861.2), and second in opponent batting average (.185) and strikeouts per 7 innings (8.08 avg.) Johnson was a member of three Summit League championship teams and made three NCAA regional tournament appearances while at North Dakota State. She was the 2010 Summit League Freshman of the Year, a four-time all-league and all-tournament selection, and a two-time all-NFCA Midwest Region pitcher. Johnson was a 12-time league pitcher of the week and four-time national pitcher of the week.

Following her career at NDSU, Johnson went overseas to the Netherlands to pitch for Centrals de Bilt in Utrecht, just outside of Amsterdam. She led the Dutch league with a 0.75 earned run average, strikeouts, and fewest walks.

After concluding her pitching career, Johnson joined the coaching ranks. She worked with the pitchers at UNLV during the 2017 season. Prior to heading to Las Vegas, Johnson was an assistant and pitching coach for the University of La Verne from 2014-16. She helped lead ULV to Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) championships in both 2015 and 2016. Under her direction, Leopards’ pitcher Katherine Kibbe improved from a 4.03 ERA as a sophomore into a conference MVP performer with a 21-6 record and 1.84 ERA as a senior.

A native of Lake Crystal, Minnesota, Johnson graduated early in January 2010 from Lake Crystal Wellcome-Memorial High School. She led LCWM to the program’s first state tournament appearance in 2009. Johnson struck out a Minnesota High School record 435 batters, including a single-game record of 21, in rolling to all-state first team and state all-tournament honors.

Johnson graduated from NDSU in 2014 with a bachelor’s degree in human development and family science. She earned her master’s degree in child life from the University of La Verne in 2017.

Coach Tien Ly began his softball coaching career with his oldest daughter, Anna in Oswego, IL. All three of his daughters have played or play softball. In 2015, his 10U Shakopee team won Tier 1 fall state championship, and in 2018, he helped the Eden Prairie 10U team win the first ever MOA Nationals championship. 

Coach Tien’s passion is with training and development of young players. His specialty is with hitting and catching. He has served as the off-season trainer for Edina, Lakeville, St Louis Park, Clutch Hitters, Midwest Power 14U and MN Ice, which he was also the head coach and player development director. He does private hitting and catching lessons out of TLC in Savage. Currently, he’s the hitting director for Mission Fastpitch and coaches the Mission 16U National team.

Coach Tien has 17 years experience, which has taught him to use a number of different methods to get great results for your athlete. He uses technology to enhance his lessons, leveraging blast and pocket radar data as well as video to get his results.

Former Minnesota Gophers catcher/first baseman Megan Dray played her first three years at North Carolina. She saw action in 126 collegiate games for the TarHeels and started in all 24 during the shortened 2020 season. As a sophomore, Dray started in 55 games as catcher and hit .301 with 41 hits for 12 extra bases. Defensively, she ranked 10th in UNC's single-season record book in runners caught stealing. As a rookie in 2018, she also played in 47 games where she split time at first, third and catcher. In her first season with the Gophers (2021) Megan started 29 games and in 2022 appeared in 51 games starting 49 of them. Prior to her time at North Carolina, Dray was a four-year starter for Brookville High School and led her team to the Virginia 3A State Championship all four years, including first-ever state titles in 2014 and 2015. 

The most decorated student-athlete in program history, Graf was a two-time NFCA All-American and four-time All-MIAC honoree during her five-year career at St. Olaf from 2016-21. She returned to the Hill after spending the 2021-22 academic year as a graduate assistant coach for the softball program at Alfred University in Alfred, N.Y.

Over her five-year career as an Ole, Graf went 80-36 with a 1.37 earned-run average in 137 appearances (106 starts), striking out 1,236 batters in 719.0 innings in the circle. She threw 70 complete games, 22 shutouts, and eight no-hitters, while holding opponents to a .156 batting average. Graf concluded her career as St. Olaf’s all-time leader in most major pitching categories, leading the way in wins, appearances, starts, complete games, shutouts, innings pitched, strikeouts, and strikeouts per seven innings (12.04), while ranking third in ERA.

Graf wrapped up her career ranked fifth in NCAA Division III history in strikeouts per seven innings and eighth in strikeouts after ranking in the top-five nationally in both categories in all four of her full seasons. Over her career, she was a four-time NFCA All-Midwest Region selection, a two-time MIAC Pitcher of the Year, a three-time Academic All-MIAC honoree, a two-time College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) Academic All-District ® selection – including being the program’s first CoSIDA Academic All-American ® in 2020 – and was one of 15 finalists for the Schutt Sports/NFCA Division III National Pitcher and Player of the Year award in 2021. Graf was also St. Olaf’s nominee for the NCAA Woman of the Year as a fifth-year senior.

After graduating from St. Olaf as an exercise science and psychology double-major, Graf served as a graduate assistant coach at Alfred University during the 2021-22 academic year while studying counseling as a graduate student. She helped the Saxons to their second-straight Empire 8 Tournament title and a berth in the NCAA Tournament, as the team finished 26-16 overall.
 

NFCA All-Region Third Team … All-Summit League Second Team … Summit League All-Tournament Team … Two-time Summit League Peak Pitcher of the Week (Feb. 27, Mar. 20) … College Sports Communicators Academic All-District Softball Team … Made 32 appearances in the circle with 25 starts … Posted a 16-11 record with two saves in 167.2 innings ... Logged a season high of 7.0 innings on 10 occasions ... Pitched 17 complete games ... Recorded six shutouts, including a pair of one hitters at Mississippi State (Mar. 14) and at Kansas City (Mar. 25) ... Combined with team for two shutouts ... Allowed 67 runs, 54 earned, posting a 2.25 ERA ... Allowed 129 hits against 624 batters faced, a .207 batting average against ... Recorded a WHIP of 1.06 ... Had 169 strikeouts, including a season high of 14 at St. Thomas (Apr. 23) ... Finished with a .974 fielding percentage ... Recorded six putouts ... Had 31 assists, including a season high of four vs. Cal State Fullerton (Feb. 18) and vs. Kansas City (May 10) ...

Please welcome Rosemount High School pitcher and MInnesota Gophers commit, Jessa Snippes to our group of pitching instructors at Wind Up Fastpitch. Jessa is a Senior at Rosemount high school and plays for the Illinois Chill. Jessa played the previous years with the Minnesota Magic. With the Rosemount Irish, Jessa has led the team to the 2021 Minnesota AAAA State Champions, 3AAAA Section Champions, South Suburban Conference Champions. She has been named Extra Innings All High School First Team (National), All State Second Team, All Metro First Team, East Metro Player of the Year Finalist, All Section (3AAAA), All Conference (South Suburban), The Breakdown's Pitcher of the Year, RHS MVP, RHS Offensive Player of the Year, RHS Defensive Player of the Year, Star Tribune's Prep Athlete of the Week, KSTP's Tria Prep Sports Salute, MN Softball Hub Player of

the Week, MN Selection for USA HPP Identifier, The Breakdown's Elite Under 35

Underclassmen (MN), RHS Captain, The Breakdown's Top 75 Juniors (MN). 

With the Magic, Jessa was part of a USSSA 18U MN Fall State Championship team, USA 16U A Nationals Runner Up, USA Gold League State Champions, All-Star Selection IDT-Colorado

Other Activities: National Honor Society, DECA (MN State Finalist), COVE (Volunteer Club), Choir, Varsity Hockey (Captain for 22-23 season)

A four year starter at Augustana University, Christina Pickett was a member of the 2019 DII National Championship team hitting a crucial home run in the semifinal game. She started 156 games with a career batting average of .303 including 34 doubles, 5 triples, and 14 home runs. 

Prior to her time at Augustana, Pickett played at East Ridge High School earning All-State honors. She has a long history with club softball in Minnesota and has been an integral part of starting the Minnesota Magic Program as a player in 2010 and now as the assistant director with an emphasis on player development. Training a multitude of youth, high school, and college players, Christina has spent many hours on the field coaching and training athletes.

Christina graduated in 2020 with a bachelor’s degree in biology and a minor in psychology. Christina is currently striving to attend Physician Assistant school.