Three months ago, South Mountain softball was in a much different state.

The Jaguars were coming off a winless season and had just hired a new head coach, Mohamed El Nounw. When El Nounw took the job, his goal was simple: develop a program from the ground up.

“I told the girls, ‘You just have to learn how to compete this year; we just have to learn how to buy in,’” El Nounw said. “My goal was to create a winning culture.”

But it wasn’t an easy turnaround. El Nounw was hired just two weeks prior to the start of the season. He had little time to familiarize himself with his team and prepare the girls.

South Mountain started the season on a five-game losing streak and was outscored 100-16 in that stretch.

“At the very beginning, I don’t think a lot of them bought in,” El Nounw said. “They were like, ‘Oh yeah, everybody says they’re going to come in here and win.’ It was just kind of how we got off on the get-go.”

But, in his first season, the Jaguars soared to new heights. South Mountain finished 8-9 overall, winning twice as many games as it won in the past five seasons.

While an 0-5 start was a rough way to begin a season, this wasn’t shocking. Three of those five opponents are currently ranked in the 5A top 20.

That experience differential proved too much in the early season.

“You’re playing against teams that have girls who have been playing club since they were seven or eight,” El Nounw said. “We have three club players who have played consistently with a club for the last five years.”

After that, it was a clean slate for the Jaguars — region play. That’s when the tide turned.

“It was kind of a wake up call,” El Nounw said. “We were like, ‘We’re pretty good.’”

South Mountain began region play on a five-game winning streak, evening the Jaguars’ overall record to 5-5. In each of those games, it was an offensive onslaught; they averaged more than 24 runs per game.

This improvement at the plate was key in El Nounw’s first season.

“We’ve definitely improved our batting,” El Nounw said. “We’ve focused a lot on that.

“Understanding how to break that down. Understanding where your hands need to go, where your eyes are.”

Not only did El Nounw encourage improvement at the plate, the girls showed initiative to get better. And it was more than just at practice and at games.

“We do batting practice at lunch with the pitching machine,” senior shortstop Nadia Torres said. “The machine has different speeds you can put, so that’s helped us a lot.”

For every player on the roster, winning is new. Before 2019, South Mountain earned just three wins in five seasons. Back-to-back wins were unheard of in prior seasons.

This new sense of hope was something the Jaguars didn’t surrender.

“We’re so used to losing, so actually getting more than two wins was crazy to us,” senior second baseman Lina Asuncion said. “We didn’t want to go back to losing.”

As the wins increased, so did the team’s bond.

“We finally learned how to work together,” senior infielder Carla Orduno said. “The chemistry has improved and we have gotten more wins because of that.”

Though 2019 went down as a season of growth, there were some concerns. The most notable? Pitching.

The Jaguars accumulated a team ERA of almost 18.00. This means they were giving up more than two runs per inning, on average.

Next year, South Mountain will return two of its varsity pitchers from the 2019 roster — Alaianna Gomez and Cynthia Dominguez. These two will use their experience and the upcoming offseason to bolster the pitching staff.

“I’m going to work hard to become better in the next few months,” Gomez said. “We have work to do, but we can become a lot better if we keep it up.”

On April 18, South Mountain’s season ended. The Jaguars defeated Sierra Linda 16-14, ending the season as winners in three of their last four contests.

“We’re not somebody that everyone just chalks up as a ‘W’ in their schedule anymore,” El Nounw said. “We’re somebody to compete with.”

For Asuncion, Orduno, Torres and several other Jaguars, their softball careers are over. But this senior class hopes to have paved the way for future success at South Mountain.

“I think we helped them get comfortable with each other,” senior Gabby Quihuis said. “They got a lot better, and I hope we helped.”

Not only was this season different for the softball program, it was a new endeavor for El Nounw.

Prior to taking the position, El Nounw had never been a head coach of any sport at any level. This first season helped him grow as a coach and learn more about himself.

“With me being a head coach, it’s definitely shifted more into hyperdrive,” El Nounw said. “You have to be much more understanding immediately, or you’re going to lose this athlete for whatever reason.”

El Nounw’s leadership also paid dividends to his athletes. They learned valuable lessons about the sport and how to compete.

“He taught us to not give up and keep fighting,” Torres said. “There’s been a lot of games where we’re down a couple runs and we came back.”

The 2019 season was undeniably a season of improvement for South Mountain’s softball program. But there’s still room — for everyone — to grow.

“I still have a lot to learn,” El Nounw said. “That’s the big thing for me.”

Now that the foundation is built, building an elite program is El Nounw’s main ambition. His goal before the season was to build a program — one he feels is still unfinished.

“A program isn’t developed in a year,” El Nounw said. “I don’t think the program is developed, but I feel like we’ve definitely developed our young ladies into thinking that they’re going to be successful on and off the field.

“Is this a successful program? Yeah, absolutely. Do I feel like I’ve developed young ladies into not only good softball players, but their character has improved? Absolutely. That’s part of developing.”

While summer marks the end of the school year, the softball grind won’t halt with the scorching temperatures. That’s when El Nounw will look to close the gap between South Mountain and 5A’s top programs.

“We’re going to be out here 6 to 8 a.m. Monday through Thursday for the entire month of June,” El Nounw said. “They’re going to get 100 ground balls; they’re going to get 100 at-bats every day to make up for that gap of girls who have been playing their entire lives and girls who haven’t.”