Get to know Haddon Heights’ Sophia Bordi, who joined softball powerhouse Oklahoma this season

Sophia Bordi has always been one step ahead.

The right-handed pitcher, who graduated a semester early from Haddon Heights High School to enroll at Oklahoma, started on the region’s best softball team, then on the state’s, and, eventually, on the nation’s, as her talent evolved and she sought better competition.

She played with older age groups, and by her freshman year of high school, she was traveling to California every weekend in the fall to compete on the Orange County Batbusters, a top club team nationally. Then she would take a red-eye flight home to make it back for school on Monday morning.

The sacrifice helped her become the No. 14 prospect and 247Sports’ No. 1 pitcher in the class of 2025. During her three years with the team, she showcased her abilities in front of top college coaches, including Oklahoma’s Patty Gasso, whose Sooners are defending national champions.

“She knew she wanted to play in college in middle school,” said her mother, Danielle Bordi. “She wanted to help a team win a national championship. She had her mind set.”

Sophia also knew that it’s harder for girls here to get recognized at that level, since many top recruits come from the West Coast. But not this Merchantville native.

Sophia, a two-time New Jersey Gatorade player of the year who led Haddon Heights to two state titles, will redshirt this season to watch and learn from her Sooners teammates. She’ll compete next spring with her five fellow members of the class of 2025 class, who make up the program’s top-ranked recruiting class.

While she has a powerful arm, she’s just as strong at the plate. She hopes to hit and pitch with the Sooners — whichever can get her on the field first.

“We’ve discussed it, and as long as I keep it up and keep working on both sides of the ball, then it’s definitely a possibility,” she said.

But enrolling early wasn’t the initial plan. Last May, while playing for her high school, Sophia took a two-week break from pitching because she was having a minor hitch in her motion. In the meantime, she played the outfield.

While warming up for a game, she dove to catch a fly ball. When she hit the ground, her left shoulder partially dislocated and she suffered a small tear in her labrum. After an MRI and meeting with a surgeon, it was determined that she didn’t need surgery, just time to heal.

“She probably took off from May to July,” Danielle said. “She could pitch, but she couldn’t really, because when you pitch, you have to lift both arms. She did that sometimes with her dad, but she couldn’t really do anything. Thank goodness it wasn’t her pitching arm, but she really just had to stop all activity for a while.”

» READ MORE: Here’s a look at the area’s top high school girls’ basketball teams

And that was a hard pill to swallow for Sophia, who spent most of her upbringing playing softball year-round.

“I think in her mind, it just put a lot of pressure on her because people are spreading rumors on how she got hurt, and then they’re saying, ‘Well, Oklahoma’s not going to want someone that’s hurt.’ But that wasn’t the case at all,” her mother said. “Softball was how she was able to manage her feelings. When she’s mad or having a bad day, she would take buckets of balls to the field with her dad, and she would just hit all day. Softball was the one thing she could always rely on, and once that was taken away, she probably struggled a little bit.”

Mike Stith, the Batbusters coach, recognized that as well. He wanted to get Sophia’s health back on track while encouraging her to love the sport again. He suggested she graduate high school early and move out to California in January to train with her coaches.

She was going to live with her future teammate, Kai Minor, an Orange County native who’s the No. 1 recruit in the class. The plan was set, and by the end of the summer Sophia had completed most of her required classes she needed to graduate.

But once Gasso, who led the Sooners to a record-setting fourth straight national championship last season, heard the news, she wanted Sophia to enroll early at the university instead.

“In January the plans changed,” she said. “It’s more common to see all the football players do it. They come in as midyears and are able to be at the school. We figured why can’t a softball player do it? So we got all the details ironed out, and we figured out our whole plan, and then it really happened.”

While Sophia has played for several area clubs — from the Cherry Hill Wild to South Jersey Mystics to PA Chaos — joining the Batbusters, she said, opened her eyes to top-notch ball.

But she also gave plenty of her opponents a headache. Her most impressive performance came in 2023, when she pitched a no-hitter in the Alliance Fastpitch Championship Series and won an 18U national title. She also was named the tournament MVP.

“Playing with Batbusters and learning with those girls and getting to be with girls from California was amazing,” Sophia said. “For the short time that I’ve been [in Oklahoma], I’ve already learned so much, so I’m really excited to be able to spend the upcoming season with them in the dugout.”

» READ MORE: Jordan Jennings’ historic softball season with MaST Community Charter helped ‘find her voice’

Coming from a small town in South Jersey, Sophia wants others who have softball aspirations in the area to know it’s possible to play for a high-level program.

“It’s great to be able to help represent New Jersey, because there’s not as many girls from New Jersey or the East Coast that get to do so,” she said. “Getting to put it on the map has been a blessing.”