Story by HaLeigh Abbott
Photos courtesy of Shannon Van Zyl

In January 2017, what began as a simple desire to improve a struggling Little League softball team has blossomed into one of Oxford’s most inspiring youth sports success stories. The Oxford Diamond Divas, created by Bob Van Zyl with help from the late Nick Sloan, has transformed from a winter training program into a comprehensive softball organization that’s reshaping the future of girls’ softball in the community.

The journey began when Van Zyl and Sloan, unhappy with the direction of the area Little League, decided to extend Van Zyl’s high school winter workout program to younger players. What they expected to be a modest turnout of 15 girls quickly grew to 17 on the first night, and within a month, swelled to 40 young athletes eager to improve their skills.

However, tragedy struck just three weeks into the program when Nick Sloan was killed in a car accident, leaving Van Zyl to carry on alone. “I had already started it, so I kept going for him,” Van Zyl reflects. “I only knew him for a few months, but I saw all of the good he was able to do.” Rob Logan, a friend of Nick’s, stepped in to help for the next two years, helping to establish the program’s foundation.

The organization found its footing in the Brandywine Valley Girls Softball League, starting with 10U and 12U teams. Success came quickly – by 2018, the 12U team went undefeated in the BVGSL. Many of those same players would later form the core of Oxford High School’s 2023 district championship team, which made two appearances in the state tournament. “I tend to forecast where things are going,” Van Zyl notes, “and in 8th grade when I was coaching the middle school, I saw this team and said they’re special and they’re going to dominate.”

Today, the Diamond Divas boasts an impressive 126 registered players, with 80-85 participating in recreational leagues and 36 in tournament play. The program offers opportunities for girls aged 5-16 in recreational ball, with tournament teams at the 10U, 14U, and 18U levels. Plans are already in place to add a 12U tournament team next fall.

What sets the Diamond Divas apart is their unwavering focus on girls’ softball. “When I first started it, people would ask what the difference between us and Little League is, and the answer is we don’t do baseball,” Van Zyl explains. “We focus completely on softball, so 100% of the money goes towards the softball players. I always felt like girls sports would get the short end of the stick next to boys sports, and I wanted to prevent that from happening.”

This dedication to excellence extends to every aspect of the program, from high-quality uniforms to specialized training. But perhaps most meaningful is the organization’s emphasis on family, symbolized by the word “Ohana” emblazoned on every jersey – a tribute to Nick Sloan’s legacy and the program’s founding principles.

The origin of this tradition is particularly touching. After Sloan’s passing, Van Zyl personally called every parent to ensure their children wouldn’t hear the news at school. Practice continued the next day because, as Van Zyl puts it, “Nick wouldn’t want us to cancel our workouts.” During that emotional session, the group discussed the importance of leaning on each other as family, referencing the concept of “Ohana” from the movie “Lilo & Stitch.” The word, along with Nick’s initials, was incorporated into the team’s logo and has become their battle cry at the end of every game.

The Diamond Divas’ commitment to inclusivity is evident in their approach to both recreational and tournament play. “Tournament ball is a luxury and a higher level of softball than rec, but the heart of the program is still in the rec teams. It creates a strong base for the softball community,” Van Zyl emphasizes. The organization welcomes players of all experience levels and even provides equipment for those who need it. Their reach extends beyond Oxford’s borders, welcoming players from throughout the region.

The program’s growth led to the creation of Southern Chester County Sports, a facility born out of necessity during COVID-19 when school facilities were unavailable. This space now serves multiple sports programs and hosts community events, further cementing the Diamond Divas’ role in local athletics.

Van Zyl, sometimes playfully known as “Coach Cheater” for his practice antics like intentionally throwing balls over players’ heads (resulting in good-natured extra push-ups), maintains that success isn’t measured solely by athletic achievement. “It doesn’t matter if you make great athletes 100% of the time,” he says. “My measure of success is when a kid is having fun and enjoying the sport and they’re making good memories.”

As the Oxford Diamond Divas continues to grow, it stands to show how a community’s commitment to its youth can create something truly special. With its blend of competitive excellence, family values, and inclusive spirit, the organization is not just developing better softball players – it’s building stronger, more confident young women who understand the true meaning of “Ohana.”

• Shared horse ownership models are making thoroughbred racing accessible to those outside of the traditionally wealthy ownership sphere.
• Partnerships and LLCs allow groups to pool resources, sharing the costs and potential profits of owning and racing horses.
• This trend has contributed to a new class of horse owner, from retired teachers and Ford workers to doctors and lawyers.

A retired JCPS teacher, a Ford worker, a youth sports coach, some UPS employees, and a few doctors and lawyers, along with roughly 30 others, beamed from the winner’s circle at Keeneland in early April. 

Bourbon Breeze had charged late down the stretch at Keeneland on April 10 to pull off her first victory of the 2025 spring racing season.

The ragamuffin crew cheering and beaming from the winner’s circle in Lexington hadn’t just bet on the filly to win the race. They were all the racehorse’s owner, and this win meant they got a piece of the purse.

“Awesome day for Motley Crew Stables,” Mick Motley, co-founder of Motley Crew Stables and co-owner of Bourbon Breeze, said in a text message after the win.

More: Sandman trainer, jockey, owner and more to know about 2025 Kentucky Derby horse

Motley, a retired JCPS teacher, is no newcomer to the horse racing world. For nearly three decades, he’s actively owned and raced horses with a slew of friends and family in a space usually reserved for the rich and the blue bloods of the thoroughbred world.

“We’ve found a way to survive for 30 years, and nobody’s ever lost a whole lot of money, and certainly nobody’s ever made a whole lot of money, but we have experienced all the highs and lows like any other owner,” Motley told The Courier Journal.

Motley and his crew, a registered LLC, aren’t alone.

Since the 1990s, horse racing, dubbed the “Sport of Kings,” has evolved through various ownership methods that allow everyday people to more easily participate in the sport. No longer do you need to have a ton of money to own part of a thoroughbred. Instead, people can join models such as a partner LLC, like Motley Crew Stables, that allows groups of people to buy in and then share profits from a winning horse, or a partnership, a company that purchases and manages racehorses for a group of individuals who share the costs and profits of the horse.

With the growth of partnerships, a new class of horse owner has emerged over the past 15 years or so. This “alternative” method to ownership means no one individual is saddled with the thousands, or millions, of dollars it can cost to buy, train and race a thoroughbred.

“It’s really a sharing of the risk, and it’s a sharing of the upside,” said Terry Finley, CEO and president of West Point Thoroughbreds, a horse racing partnership that helps clients become thoroughbred owners.

“The world of racing, it’s such a fascinating world,” Finley added. “You’ve got kings, you’ve got CEOs, you’ve got movie stars, you’ve got athletes, you’ve got billionaires, you’ve got people who own pizza shops and bars and teachers. It just runs across the across the spectrum.”

And high-level success is not unfathomable for people who get into the horse racing world through a partnership or other shared ownership ventures.

In 2024, Motley Crew Stables won a race at Churchill Downs Racetrack during Wednesday of Kentucky Derby Week. After winning on a prominent race day, the excitement from the group of owners was palpable as they overflowed the winner’s circle, forcing Churchill Downs officials to corral them on the track for their victory photo.

In 2022, West Point Thoroughbreds’ clients were owners of Flightline, who won the Breeders’ Cup at Keeneland.

This year, Finley and team are hoping to replicate that success with Sandman, who won the Arkansas Derby on March 29 and punched his ticket for the Kentucky Derby, held this year on May 3.

More: Sandman trainer, jockey, owner and more to know about 2025 Kentucky Derby horse

“It feels like anybody can get in now … I think myself and anybody else in our group, we’re living proof that you can get into the horse racing business,” Motley said.

‘It’s a journey’

Historically, owning a racehorse would be a daunting endeavor for the roughly 500 active clients at West Point Thoroughbreds, but the partnership model has made the sport feel accessible for the people who share ownership of some 145 racehorses.

“It’s very similar to other investments and other structures outside of racing; you’re much more powerful when you get a group together and you can pool your resources,” Finley said. “That’s really at the heart of partnerships, the ability to pool your resources to increase your chances to get the one, or hopefully more than one, horse that makes it all worthwhile.”

In 1996, Motley Crew Stables started with roughly 30 co-owners and $30,000, half of which was used to claim the group’s first horse, Phony Prospect.

More: Which horses will run in the 2025 Kentucky Derby? See the full field for Churchill Downs

Motley said he likes to keep his group to no more than 40 partners at a time and always wants to keep positive cash reserves from share buy-ins and horse winnings, so members aren’t expected to have regular payments for the horse. Anytime the horse wins purse money, it rolls into the group’s operating budget.

“It’s very accessible, and once you find that out, you still get the same thrills as those guys running … on Derby Day,” Motley said.

Tim Sanders, a worker at Ford and a semi-recent addition to the crew in the last seven years, has put in no more than $4,000 since joining.

For him, like many others, horse racing is an investment, not a “get rich quick” opportunity, and something he hopes to remain part of for a long time.

“It’s not a sprint, it’s a journey,” Sanders said. “You’ve got to be in it for the long haul to be able to enjoy the fruits of the labor.”

And the “long haul” may be key for a sport that has seen gradual decline in attendance and on-site gambling from fans as new forms of sports gambling have popped up across the country.

“I just shudder to think what our sport would be without partnerships … I think our industry probably would be in tatters without partnerships,” Finley said.

Sanders and Motley’s love and passion for horse racing began on the backside of Churchill Downs Racetrack.  

More: Simone Biles, Livvy Dunne will command ‘Riders Up’ for 2025 Kentucky Derby, Oaks

As teenagers, both spent time around Angel Montano Sr., one of the winningest trainers in Kentucky in the 1970s. Sanders grew up across the street from the track, and Motley would walk and groom the horses. That access introduced the men to the unbridled spirit for which Kentucky horse racing is known and created a life-long fixation.

As they got older, their love for horses, and the sport of racing, never faded. Motley would go on to co-found Motley Crew Stables in 1996 and Sanders would join another horse ownership group before making his way to Motley’s team about seven years ago.

“It changes lives,” Finley said of horse racing. “It captivates people. It gives them a whole new world to jump into and to explore.”

‘The sport of little paupers’

For some, like Gene Palka, going into horse racing wasn’t a lifelong affair.

After he retired from the U.S. Army and moved back to Kentucky with his wife, Cindy, they bought three pleasure horses within three months, then decided the next step was to go in on a racehorse.

“When we came to Kentucky, it was nice, but there was something missing,” Cindy Palka said. “And then once we did invest in that first one and you do OK, you’re like, ‘I really like this.'”

One investment of about $10,000 into a horse 15 years ago was all it took for the Palkas to be hooked. Now, they spend their retirement traveling to racetracks around the country to watch their horses, even making a showing at the Breeders’ Cup at Churchill Downs Racetrack in 2018.

“We are not kings and queens, but we can be among them, and the horses have been our pathways into these incredible venues,” Gene Palka said.

As they watched their newest horse, Ivory and Ebony, barrel down the track at Keeneland on April 7 during its rescheduled opening day, the Palkas couldn’t help but gawk at their pretty filly, who placed second in the fifth race.

“You have euphoria,” Cindy Palka said after the race.

But it’s not all joy. The Palkas have dealt with everything, from serious injuries of their horses to a win at Laurel Park in Maryland, after which they watched the same horse be handed over to a new owner who bought it just before the race started.

Through it all, the sheer pleasure of horse racing ownership and the community they’ve found along the racing circuit has kept them in the sport.

More: Kentucky Derby continues to set wagering records as gambling on horse racing declines

“We’ve had the highest of highs and the lowest of lows,” Gene Palka said.

The highs and lows of the sport, Sanders, with Motley Crew Stables said, hit the same whether you’re the ruler of Dubai or a Louisville born and bred blue-collar worker.

With the pinnacle of horse racing just around the corner, Motley, Finley, Sanders and the Palkas gear up to spend long days at the track, in the paddock, lingering on the backside and enjoying the world of horse racing.

“It’s not just the sport of kings; it’s the sport of little paupers like us,” Motley said.

Contact business reporter Olivia Evans at oevans@courier-journal.com or on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter at @oliviamevans_.

This story was updated to add a video.  

MOORHEAD — Inspire Innovation Lab in Moorhead is asking the community for donations of used digital cameras to help teach children the fundamentals of photography.

The center plans to host a summer photography camp, with the goal of collecting between five and 10 cameras, along with memory cards and chargers.

Paraprofessional Stella Snyder said the idea is to help children explore their creativity while learning about key concepts such as the rule of thirds and depth of field.

“As a photographer, I know how hard it is to get your hands on a decent DSLR camera, so if we had any amount of donations for that, with their chargers and SD cards, that would be amazing,” Snyder said.

Organizers say the cameras could also be used during the school year as part of Inspire’s curriculum.

Isak Dinesen joined WDAY-TV as a reporter in September 2024. He previously worked as a multimedia journalist at WAOW-TV in Wausau, Wisconsin for three years. He graduated from NDSU in 2020, majoring in Journalism and minoring in Sports Communication at MSUM.

WATERVILLE, Maine —

Sports are a big part of many kids’ lives, but for a growing number of families, the cost of keeping their children on the field is becoming a serious challenge.

A recent survey conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of the nonprofit Good Sports found that 56% of parents are concerned they won’t be able to afford sports for their kids next year due to rising expenses. That concern is being felt right here in Maine.

From enrollment fees and travel expenses to equipment costs, the price tag on youth sports participation is steadily climbing.

“A lot of kids are getting cut out of playing because of those costs,” said Christy Keswick, co-founder and president of Good Sports.

According to the Aspen Institute’s State of Play Report, the average family now spends nearly $900 a year for one child to participate in their primary sport.

Good Sports is working to bring those costs down by providing equipment, apparel and footwear to youth organizations across the country.

“We don’t want that opportunity and those benefits just to be for a chosen few. We want to make sure that all kids get that opportunity,” Keswick said.

One local organization benefiting from Good Sports’ mission is the Alfond Youth & Community Center (AYCC) in Waterville. The center revamped its pricing model with help from donations, allowing more families to afford participation in its wide variety of sports programs.

“What we do is we allow people to sign up, no questions asked. Ten-dollar increments from $0 to $100,” said Beth LaFountain, Athletic Director at the AYCC.

LaFountain said the pay-as-you-go approach is helping prevent kids from being sidelined by financial barriers.

“You can argue that sports and athletics right now are more important than ever in a child’s development,” she said. “I want the kid that needs the program more than the program needs the kid.”

For Jeremy Jones, a Waterville father of three young athletes, the rising costs of sports have sparked tough conversations at home.

“It was never a real consideration, but it’s been a thought, you know, and concern, in the past, as to how we were going to afford it,” he said.

Thanks to the AYCC’s support, Jones said those discussions haven’t come up recently.

“That would be a hard conversation. I know there are families that have had to have that conversation in the past,” Jones said.

He hopes more communities in Maine follow suit in making youth sports more accessible.

“It’s been amazing to be able to see the kids come together and not have those barriers or hurdles or boundaries that maybe prevent them from doing the same things that their peers get to do on the weekends and after school and playing sports,” Jones said.

If your family is feeling the financial pressure of youth sports, local programs like the AYCC may be able to help. If equipment is a concern, you can reach out directly to Good Sports for support.

LOCK HAVEN, Pa. – On Tuesday evening, April 22, the Lock Haven men’s and women’s soccer teams hosted a free youth clinic for the West Branch Soccer Club.
 
The men’s and women’s soccer student-athletes and current head coaches Patrick Long and Jesse Urquhart ran a successful event for roughly 175 local youth players.  It was a great evening for soccer in Lock Haven.
 
West Branch Soccer Club is a non-profit youth sports organization that continues to grow and support soccer in our community.
 

FAIRFAX, Va. — The George Mason University men’s soccer team took to the field with some of their youngest fans on Take Your Junior Patriot to Work Day, held this year on April 24, offering an energetic and fun-filled soccer clinic for the children of university employees.

Held on the soccer practice field, the clinic brought together dozens of kids eager to kick the ball around with George Mason student-athletes. Take Your Junior Patriot to Work Day is an annual event that invites George Mason employees to bring their children to campus for a day of hands-on learning and engaging activities.

“It’s always great putting on the Junior Patriot Soccer Clinic,” said head coach Rich Costanzo. “We want our players to be well known in this area as incredible role models to young boys and girls, and we have some very special student-athletes on our team who take pride in giving back and engaging with this community.”

As the clinic wrapped up, each participant received a George Mason soccer scarf, and families had the opportunity to take photos with the players. The event reinforced the university’s commitment to fostering a welcoming and inclusive campus environment for both staff and their families, and continues to inspire the future Patriots of Mason Nation.