East Rowan shortstop Lily Kluttz

Lily Kluttz.

 

By Mike London

Salisbury Post

GRANITE QUARRY — Now East Rowan shortstop Lily Kluttz knows what the perfect swing feels like.

The 5-foot-5, lefty-swinging Kluttz hit a ball toward the moon in the second round of the 3A state playoffs, a monstrous shot that everyone at the field knew was gone as soon as it left her bat. That mighty blow decided a tense 1-0 victory against Kings Mountain and wrapped up Rowan County Player of the Year laurels for Kluttz.

“That was the best pitcher we faced all season — very tough,” Kluttz said. “It was the sixth inning. It was a 3-and-2 pitch and I knew she really didn’t want to walk me in a scoreless game. She gave me a good pitch to hit, middle out, and I put a good swing on it. It felt really good. I got all of it.”

A junior shortstop, Kluttz also was the South Piedmont Conference Player of the Year. She was the best player on the best team, so it was hard to argue with that. East pitchers threw strikes and got ground balls, and Kluttz keyed a Mustangs’ defense that was crisp in 25 of the team’s 27 outings with a .976 fielding percentage.

“We had a special team,” Kluttz said. “I started playing T-Ball when I was 3, and I can remember playing with some of my high school teammates when we were 6. There was always a lot of good chemistry there.”

Kluttz’s father, Jason, was a fine football and baseball player at Salisbury High and assists with East softball, while her mother, Kaci Mulkey Kluttz, was a volleyball and softball standout at North Rowan.

Lily’s athletic future may have headed in a different direction in middle school, but an illness intervened.

“I was planning to play volleyball at Erwin Middle School, but I had mono the week of tryouts,” she said. “So it’s always been just softball and basketball for me.”

Kluttz was a steady point guard for a senior-heavy East basketball team that had quite a bit of success in 2024-25 and won the Dale’s Sporting Goods Sam Moir Christmas Classic.

“We had some good scorers,” Kluttz said. “My job was to find the hot hand, get the ball to the right person at the right time.”

While she’s a solid basketball player who may be asked to score a lot more as a senior, softball is Kluttz’s bread and butter.

“Great work ethic, always striving to improve her game by paying attention to even the smallest details, and she has accomplished a great deal,” East head coach Todd McNeely said. “Hard-working, deeply dedicated to softball. Great character. Humble, caring. Someone who is always thinking of her teammates more than herself. She’s quiet, but she’s clutch. We call her the ‘Silent Assassin.'”

Kluttz launched her first high school homer as a freshman in a comeback win against South Rowan that showed she could become a special player.

Her sophomore season she produced a six-RBI game against the West Rowan squad that has been East’s main rival in recent seasons.

Her junior season was just about a non-stop highlight film, as the Mustangs went 23-4, won the SPC regular season with two exciting victories against West and reached the third round of the playoffs.

“Kluttz didn’t always hit, but it seemed like she always hit when they really needed it,” West coach Jimmy Greene said.

North Davidson was one of the better teams East played outside the SPC, and Kluttz had two homers and a double to spark a 7-1 victory.

She had five RBIs in a win against Northwest Cabarrus and teamed with Chloe Shank for back-to-back homers in East’s other game with the Trojans.

She homered in the 6-5 win against West that decided the SPC regular season.

In the SPC tournament semifinals, playing against a Central Cabarrus team that had upset the Mustangs during the regular season, Kluttz homered and drove in three runs.

Just about every East game included a defensive gem by Kluttz, and her final offensive numbers as East’s No. 2 hitter were outstanding — a .500 batting average, a .580 on-base percentage, eight homers, 41 hits, 46 runs scored and 33 RBIs.

“Stats are fine, but stats always depend on the lineup around you,” Kluttz said. “Girls drove me in if I got on base and girls got on base ahead of me. The bottom of our lineup was very good. I’ve got to give credit to a lot of girls and our coaches for the season we had. No one has ever won an award unless a lot of people helped them.”

Kluttz is still 16. She will turn 17 in July.

She is playing Lady Legion softball this summer. She played on one of the two Rowan Junior Lady Legion teams that won back-to-back state championships.