Shelby Boswell scored the game winning run during last spring’s state championship game against New Life Christian, but the Meadowview Christian pitcher didn’t get to do much celebrating with her team.

Boswell, now a senior, was injured sliding into home plate and ended up at the emergency room getting her knee checked out. She didn’t even get to pose for the team photo after the game. She tore all the tissues in her knee and wore a large leg brace for the next six weeks.

“It sounds like something you’d see in a movie,” Boswell said of the game winning play, that almost sounds scripted when she says it out loud. “I feel like my whole life is a movie.”

Boswell is a softball junkie who plays the sport year-round. She serves as Meadowview’s starting pitcher in many games, but she also plays third base and catcher on her travel ball team. Boswell is easy to spot on the field because she’s usually laughing or trying to be upbeat, regardless of the situation.

“Sometimes I catch myself because I start getting a lil bit mad,” she said. “Attitudes are really contagious, especially when you play sports, so you have to always keep a good one so everybody around you has a good attitude. If everybody has a good attitude, they are going to play well.”

Boswell had a scary moment in middle school, where she was injured in a basketball game and suffered a concussion. For a couple of weeks, she lost parts of her memory. Eventually, it all came back, but it understandably still scared her parents.

“My mom wanted me to quit playing sports forever,” Boswell said.

Boswell said she never let it scare her, and once she recovered, she resumed playing sports. Now, she’s planning to play softball in college. Once her senior year at Meadowview is over, she plans to attend Huntingdon College and study physical therapy, a career she chose after rehabbing her knee.

Boswell is one of the leaders on the Meadowview softball team, which lost five seniors from 2016’s championship squad. Early on, the team has gone through some growing pains, but she said she expected it and is trying to help the team progress however she can.

“Last year, the year’s past, they didn’t get as much experience because we had older players,” Boswell said.

It’s rare that she has a moment where she’s not playing softball. Boswell plays for Chaos, a travel ball team based in Tuscaloosa. During the fall, spring and summer, there’s rarely a weekend where she isn’t on the softball field somewhere. This week is Spring Break, so there are no games scheduled. For the first time in a while, she’ll have a chance to relax.

“I don’t have anything planned, and I’m so excited,” she said. “I get to sleep in and if I do anything, it’ll be kind of spontaneous.”