Relentless 18-year-old Dee Breen is SA’s best junior coach for 2025
Balancing school, three sports, two jobs and marathon weekends on the diamond - meet the young junior coach just crowned SA’s best.
Balancing school, three sports, two jobs and a nine-game weekend is tough — but for Vista teenager Dee Breen, it’s simply the rhythm of a life built around helping kids fall in love with softball.
The 18-year-old Banksia Park International High School graduate has become a quiet linchpin of her local sporting community.
She coaches two junior softball sides, helps guide her school’s Year 7–9 baseball squad to top-four state finishes, mentors an adults’ winter baseball team and spends most weekends umpiring from dawn until dusk.
She juggles it all while working nights as a newspaper delivery driver and assisting at Code Camp, on top of training and playing across softball, baseball and cricket.
Ms Breen said she has never forgotten what it felt like to be the kid left on the outer, and that early experience drives everything she does now.
“I became a coach so no one else would feel how sad it is to be alone,” she said. “I want to create an inclusive and engaging environment for every player.”
Many of her juniors are newcomers, some barely eight, and she said watching them master a skill or reach a personal goal is what keeps her going.
“I’m proud of the small wins,” she said.
“We’ve built a really supportive culture with cheering on the bench and players trying new positions. It’s about confidence as much as fundamentals.”
Her weekends are a blur of early starts and late finishes. Saturdays stretch from 8am to 9pm — coaching the first two timeslots, playing one, then umpiring three more. Sundays are cricket and more umpiring. Weeknights swing between trainings, gym sessions, study and planning drills.
The workload is paying off. Ms Breen has risen to Level 2 umpire, travelled interstate for national events and was selected for the U14 boys and girls national championships umpiring team, earning junior umpire of the year for the 2024–25 season.
She credits long-time mentor Rene Gallagher, who has supported her since she first picked up a glove in 2017, with shaping her style and confidence.
This week, all the behind-the-scenes commitment culminated in her being named SA’s best junior sports coach of 2025 — an honour she described as the icing on an already massive year.
“I honestly wasn’t expecting to be voted,” she said.
“I’m very grateful for those who thought of me and voted for me. I like to think people voted for my passion and dedication. I’d also like to think it’s because I’m supportive and helpful.”
Even informing her about the award proved a challenge. When The Advertiser reached out on Monday, she was being her usual busy self — mid-chaos, shuttling between commitments, and finally free only after 9pm.
She thanked her club and her biggest supporter.
“To the community and to my club, Raptors Softball Club, I’d like to thank them,” she said. “And my mum, who does a lot behind the scenes.”
Ms Breen hopes the accolade encourages more young volunteers to step up and said Raptors Softball Club remains open to anyone “of any age with any skill set” looking for a fun, inclusive place to play.
Her next goal is to continue her coaching accreditations while pursuing a software engineering apprenticeship at Adelaide University.
More Coverage
Originally published as Relentless 18-year-old Dee Breen is SA’s best junior coach for 2025
