Nicole Tobon

About Me:

I’m Nicole Tobon, and I grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I started playing softball when I was 8 years old and decided I wanted to become a college softball player when I was 15. I was a 4-year varsity softball starter at Bloomington Jefferson High School (2009-2012). In my junior year, I led my team to make school history by being the first softball team to win the section and go to the State Tournament. In the last two years of my high school career, I received the following accolades: 2x’s All-State, 2x’s All-Metro, 4x’s All-Conference, 4x’s Team MVP, and 1x Jaguar Spirit Award. 

I reached my dream of becoming a college softball player when I became the 1st player from Minnesota to be recruited, play, and graduate from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign softball program. I like to say being a student-athlete in the Big 10 Conference is a Big Deal. My time as a Fighting Illini brought ample personal growth and life lessons during the four years.  

After my first summer playing NCAA Division 1 softball, I began coaching softball to give back to my home community. I developed a love for coaching softball students and role modeling female leadership. At the beginning of 2019, I officially started my own business - Softball Students, where I give group catching clinics in Minneapolis, Minnesota. 

When did you decide to pursue the dream of playing college softball? For me, it was my freshman year of high school, and I just found out I made the varsity softball team. I had been playing softball for five years up to that point and hadn’t realized that I was one of the best players yet. Reaching the achievement of being selected to the varsity team gave me the self-confidence to commit to setting my sights for the next level of competition: NCAA Division 1 college softball.

To say that my dreams of becoming a college softball player were ambitious would be an understatement given the circumstances of when the dream was formed. I faced a bunch of challenges in my recruiting process like coaches telling me I didn’t have the skills to play Division 1 softball, and my family wasn’t able to afford the top travel club team in the state that went to all the exposure tournaments. The state of Minnesota wasn’t known for producing high caliber softball players compared to other warmer weather states. Nevertheless, I persisted.

I was told that to be recruited to an NCAA Division 1 university; I would need to be the best hitter in the state and have a reputation to back it up. So I became an All-State softball hitter and led Minnesota AAA softball with the top batting average in my junior year of high school. My reputation for being one of the best hitters in the state earned me an invite to the top travel club. That invite allowed me to compete at national tournaments, which in turn lead to giving me the exposure to D1 college coaches and high caliber competition that I needed.

The last challenge was one of the toughest to break - college softball coaches believe that players from the midwest couldn’t advance as much because they can’t play outside year-round. I found a way I overcame the limiting belief of NCAA Division 1 coaches that a player from Minnesota, a state not yet on the map for softball, could compete at their university and help them win championships.

I convinced them by consistently emailing them sharing my story and going to their camps relentlessly to show them how committed I was to make this dream a reality. On May 1 of my senior year of high school, I committed to going to the University of Illinois.

Now that my time as a student-athlete is behind me, I believe it is essential to help thousands more young women achieve their goal of playing college softball. My mission by teaming up with Mpowher Athlete Advantage is to mentor softball students so they can also achieve their dream of playing collegiate softball and excel at the highest level of competition. I’m looking forward to working with you in the Mpowher Athlete Advantage programs.