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9 JUNE, 2026

Perfect OAM game By Narelle Coulter Softball stalwarts Betty McGuire and her daughter Sandra Evans have scored a double home run in this year’s King’s Birthday Honours. Both women were awarded Medals of the Order of Australia for their services to softball. The duo were nominated by Sandra’s husband Leigh, himself an OAM recipient in 2024 for his contribution to softball umpiring. Rounding out the remarkable family achievement, Betty’s husband and Sandra’s father, the late Kerry McGuire, was also a past OAM recipient as a founding life member of the Sunshine Softball Association. “The fi rst time I heard that I had been nominated I was shocked because you don’t go in for those things for yourself; you go in for the athletes, to help them grow and to grow the sport,” said Sandra, who could fi nally share the news with her mum on Monday. “It is so nice to be recognised. Softball coaching is an unpaid job, it’s a voluntary job that takes many hours of work. While I was doing it I had a young family but it never felt like a burden,” said Sandra, who lives at Hillside. Both mother and daughter are legends within the Sunshine Softball Association and wider softball community. Betty, 91, who lives in Burnside, recalls that in the 1950s, Sunshine police Sergeant Frank McLeod decided there wasn’t enough sport in the local area for girls and women. Kerry attended the meeting in Braybrook called by Sgt McLeod to gauge interest in forming a softball club. Kerry returned home to inform Betty that she was the vice-president of the newly formed Sunshine District Women’s Softball Association. “It was a huge decision that we made because the girls that formed the fi rst committee were very young. I was the eldest at 21. The others were teenagers who were still at secondary college, mainly from Deer Park, and they were absolutely wonderful, not frightened to make decisions,” recalled Betty who would later act as secretary from 1959 until 2004. The association started with six teams 1956.

Betty McGuire OAM. (Damjan Janevski) 557417_04 Inset: Sandra Evans OAM. (Supplied)

In 1970 the association got a permanent home at More Park in Ardeer and interest in the sport exploded. That year the association fielded 72 teams. “The 1970s were our big time. We had under 12 kids teams right through to adult teams.” “I loved it,” recalled Betty who played in the early years and in 1958 captained a representative team that played in the Victorian Championships. “I played for couple of years then I decided because I had always loved rules and the application of rules I decided I would rather be an umpire,” she explained. Betty learnt by “trial and error” and eventually sat umpire exams to qualify for her B grade umpire’s badge and later her A

grade badge. She was a state umpire from 1973 until 1989 and later qualified as an international umpire. d She says a highlight was being named an umpire for the World Series held in Queensland in 1980. She also mentored young players in assistant and head coaching roles and is a life member of Softball Victoria. Diamond 1 at More Park is named the Betty McGuire Diamond. Sandra took a different route than her mum, honing her skills as a coach rather than an umpire. Sandra coached at Sunshine from 1979 until around 2010. She was also a player for many decades, including in state teams.

S d h l b S f b ll Victoria Vi i Sandra has also been a Softball head coach, most notably for the under 16 boys state team in 2011-2012. She has also been an IT specialist coach and assistant coach to the Under 19 men’s and women’s state teams. Sandra has also performed many roles for Softball Australia including as an IT specialist coach, chair of selectors, and assistant coach of the under 19 Men’s Australian Team at the ISF IX Junior Men’s World Championship in Argentina in 2012. Continued: Page 12-13.

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