Jill Barrett will be entering her third season in the National Pro Fastpitch league this coming summer. The two-time All-NPF selection was recently dealt from the Akron Racers to the reigning champion Chicago Bandits.

In her two seasons with the Racers, the standout shortstop established herself as a mainstay in the Racer lineup. During the 2015 season, Barrett
hit .339 and led the league with 56 hits while scoring 26 runs.

Prior to her professional career, Barrett was an All-American at the University of Tulsa. She graduated in 2014 with school career records in batting average (.399), runs scored (183), and hits (322) and is second all-time at Tulsa with 9 triples.

We had to opportunity to talk with one of the best shortstops in the country today and get to know her a bit more in our Friday Focus.
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You grew up in Arkansas, went to the University of Tulsa, drafted by Akron, and now you'll be in Chicago this summer. What excites you about joining the Chicago Bandits?
The whole organization is top-notch, and I'm eager to be able to continue my softball career with such a great organization. I'm really excited to meet all of the girls. I've gotten to play against them so I kind of know what they're like, but I'm excited to meet them as well.

Photo: espn

What's your favorite success quote or mantra you try to live by?
I do kind of -- if it's not broke don't fix it. I mean I feel like my swing is very unorthodox and over the years my coaches haven't really tried to "fix" it, so to speak. They've always said since it's worked, they're not going to try to fix what has been working.

Can you remember a time in your softball journey where you encountered failure? Take us to that time, share that story, and some of the lessons learned.
Sure. I would say last year during part of the season I went on a little bit of a dry spell -- had three, four, five games in a row where I was unsuccessful at the plate -- but my philosophy has always been 'well, there's always tomorrow.' So I was fortunate to stay in the lineup and continue battling out of the slump. I never get to down on myself, you know so if I make an out I just focus on the next time. So I would say just not being too hard on myself during that slump was how I was able to not allow it to negatively impact me on the field as well. You know, because there's two sides to the game -- defense and offense -- so even if one is failing, you can still produce with the other side as well.

What do you do in the off-season?
Right now I'm a graduate assistant at the University of Tulsa. I'm in the academic department working with student athletes. I'm getting my master's in math and science education, and I will be done with that in May. I'm the graduate manager of the softball team as well at Tulsa.

Congratulations on the master's degree. Do you see yourself using your degree immediately or how many more seasons do you see yourself playing with the NPF?
I'd like to play as many seasons as my career and body will allow. I can definitely see myself playing for three or four more years. I am engaged so I would like to plan a wedding some time around the NPF, but it's hard being gone for a third of the year.

Congratulations on the engagement as well! When's the big day?
Well, neither one of us are big planners so we set it for next October but I have a feeling it'll be more like a year and a half or so.

Photo: Akron Racers

What keeps you motivated to continue to play in the NPF?
I feel like that is one of the easier parts of our job. We don't really need much motivation because it's a passion and that's what we live for day to day. So being able to go out there and compete -- we're all competitors at heart -- so competing isn't the hard part. And when we can inspire all the young girls who come out and watch our sport, I think that's what keeps up going. Trying to grow the sport, trying to grow the youth and broaden their knowledge of softball.

What improvements would you like to see made in the league?
I would love for it to be an actual career. Right now it's just three months in the summertime. If it could grow to where it could actually be a career that would be amazing.

If you had to choose between a walk off home run or a diving web gem play on defense to save the game? Which would you choose?
Definitely a walk-off home run. I feel like with the home run everyone gets the wait then when you cross home plate they're all there!