For some athletes, graduating from high school means closing the door on one chapter and beginning another somewhere else.
For Caitlin Terrell Jurcik and Camden Matthews, leaving Scottsboro High School was never really the end of their Wildcat stories.
They left home, continued playing the games they loved, earned college degrees, learned from coaches along the way and began figuring out where life would take them next.
Eventually, it brought both of them right back to Scottsboro.
Scottsboro High School has announced Jurcik as the new head coach of the Wildcats softball program, while Matthews has been named head junior varsity baseball coach and assistant varsity baseball coach.
For two former Wildcats, the opportunity represents much more than a coaching position.
It is a chance to pour back into the programs and community that once poured into them.
For Jurcik, becoming Scottsboro’s head softball coach is the fulfillment of a dream that began long before she ever wore a varsity uniform.
A Scottsboro native and Scottsboro High School graduate, Jurcik began playing travel softball at just eight years old. She eventually spent six years playing varsity softball for the Wildcats, primarily at first base and pitcher.
Her years in the Scottsboro uniform included plenty of success.
Jurcik was part of three Area Championship teams, two Area Runner-up teams, five Regional appearances, a Regional Championship and a State Runner-up finish.
By the end of her Scottsboro career, she ranked second in program history in home runs, RBIs and games played and third in career at-bats.
She was also named All-Area during her senior season.
The significance of Scottsboro softball in Jurcik’s life goes beyond statistics, trophies and postseason appearances.
It began with family. “This has been a dream of mine since I was a little girl watching my older sister play,” Jurcik said.
After Scottsboro, Jurcik continued her softball career at Lurleen B. Wallace Community College in Andalusia, where she played first base and pitched.
In 2021, she was selected to serve on the Alabama Community College Conference Student-Athlete Leadership Council.
Even while she was still playing, coaching began becoming part of her future.
Jurcik started coaching travel softball during college and later spent a season on the LBW coaching staff following graduation.
Eventually, that path brought her home. Jurcik has spent the past three seasons working with the Scottsboro softball program, serving as an assistant coach during the 2023–2024 and 2025–2026 seasons and as a volunteer coach during the 2024–2025 season.
She has also provided private softball instruction since 2020.
Now, she will lead the program she grew up watching and eventually represented herself.
“Becoming the head softball coach at Scottsboro means more to me than I can put into words,” Jurcik said.
“Softball has given me some of the greatest memories, relationships, and lessons of my life, and now I get the opportunity to help our girls experience that same love for the game.”
Her goals for the Wildcats stretch far beyond wins and losses.
“I want our program to be known not only for its success, but for its discipline, heart, resilience and the way our players love and respect the game and one another,” she said.
“I couldn’t be more excited to get to work and continue building a program that our school and community are proud of.”
Jurcik’s Scottsboro roots run deep.
She was born and raised in the community, as were both of her parents, and she and her siblings are all Scottsboro High School graduates.
Outside of softball, she serves as a Kindergarten Special Education teacher and is also an assistant coach for Scottsboro’s inaugural girls flag football team.
Matthews’ road back to Scottsboro took him through several college baseball programs and eventually on to one of college baseball’s biggest postseason stages.
Even when baseball carried him away from home, Matthews said returning to Scottsboro was always somewhere in the plan.
“I always wanted to come back,” he said. “I love Scottsboro.”
Matthews graduated from Scottsboro High School in 2021 and began his college baseball career at Marion Military Institute, where he spent two years at the junior college level.
A versatile player, Matthews pitched while also playing first and third base.
After graduating from Marion, he transferred to Miles College in Birmingham, where he spent two seasons playing NCAA Division II baseball.
Matthews again contributed both on the mound and in the field while completing his bachelor’s degree in business administration.
It was at Miles that Matthews began compiling an impressive collection of individual honors.
During his first season there, Matthews earned First Team All-SIAC honors as a pitcher, was named the SIAC Relief Pitcher of the Year and earned First Team utility honors for his contributions both at the plate and on the mound.
He followed that performance with another strong season, again earning SIAC Relief Pitcher of the Year and First Team All-SIAC recognition.
Matthews also earned Second Team Division II All-South Region honors as a relief pitcher.
For his graduate season, Matthews transferred to Alabama State University, where he concentrated solely on pitching.
Once again, he made an impact. Matthews was named SWAC Relief Pitcher of the Year and earned First Team All-SWAC honors.
His final college season also gave him an opportunity few players experience.
Alabama State won its conference championship and advanced to the NCAA Tournament, competing in the Tuscaloosa Regional alongside Alabama, Oklahoma State and USC Upstate.
Matthews pitched against both Alabama and Oklahoma State during the regional.
After five years of college baseball, his playing career had taken him from Scottsboro to Marion, Birmingham and Montgomery and eventually to NCAA postseason baseball.
The original plan was to remain at Alabama State for another year as a graduate assistant while completing his master’s degree.
Then Scottsboro had an opening. Matthews knew opportunities to return home do not always arrive exactly when expected, and there was no guarantee the same opportunity would be waiting a year later. He decided not to let it pass.
Now, Matthews is back at Scottsboro High School as head JV baseball coach and assistant varsity coach, where one of his primary responsibilities will be working with the Wildcats’ pitchers.
For Matthews, the philosophy on the mound begins with something simple.
Throw strikes.
“Strikes is the main thing,” Matthews said. “That’s what I’m going to harp on them about.
Throw strikes. You can’t walk people.” It is a lesson he carried throughout his own career.
“I’d rather give you a hit than keep walking and hitting people and giving them free bases,” he said.
Matthews wants to give his players more than instruction about pitching mechanics and throwing strikes.
He knows firsthand how much influence a coach can have on a young athlete.
He played for several coaches during his Scottsboro career, but he particularly remembers the impact his pitching coach had during his junior and senior seasons.
Matthews credits that relationship with helping him develop into the pitcher he eventually became.
Matthews said, “I don’t know if I would’ve got to where I was without him being here.
I had a really good senior year because of all he did for me.”
The relationship did not end when Matthews graduated.
He still stays in contact with his former coach and now finds himself thinking about that example as he begins coaching players of his own.
“I remember how he influenced me, and that’s how I want to influence my players,” Matthews said.
There were plenty of sacrifices behind the scenes, too.
Matthews credits his father with pouring countless hours into helping him chase his baseball dreams and making sacrifices that allowed him to continue playing.
Now, after years of being the player receiving that investment from parents and coaches, Matthews finds himself on the other side. He is the coach.
His return is also a continuation of a family connection to baseball, with his grandfather having played the game generations earlier.
In addition to coaching, he is teaching freshman Career Prep at Scottsboro High School.
Jurcik and Matthews return to Scottsboro with different stories and different responsibilities.
One will take over the softball program she dreamed of leading since she was a little girl watching her older sister play.
The other returns after a college baseball career that culminated with conference championships and many individual honors.
Yet their stories share something important. Both know what it feels like to be the young Wildcat looking toward the dugout for guidance.
They know what it means when a coach believes in a player, pushes a player and invests time that may not pay off until years later.
And now, they have the opportunity to become those people for someone else.
For Jurcik, it is an opportunity to give another generation of Scottsboro girls the memories, relationships and lessons softball gave her.
For Matthews, it is the chance to stand beside young pitchers and players much like the coaches who once stood beside him.
Their playing careers took them beyond Scottsboro.
Their education opened doors elsewhere.
They could have continued building lives and careers somewhere else.
Instead, both roads led back to the place where their own journeys began.
Back to Scottsboro.
Back to the Wildcats.
And this time, they aren’t coming back as players.
They’re coming home as coaches.
by Heather Dohring
