Amber Fiser

Classroom

Amber is a two-time Academic All-Big Ten honoree and 2019 CoSIDA Academic All-District recipient. She is a two-time Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award Winner for having over a 3.70 GPA. Amber majors in business and marketing education and will graduate with her degree this spring.

Character

Amber’s toughest battle has come off the softball field. Early on in high school her father Rob began having kidney failure. Years later, as her collegiate sophomore campaign wound down and the Gophers were on their way to winning a third straight Big Ten title, Rob began feeling sick again and was diagnosed with a rare form of prostate cancer. Amber spent the majority of her historic junior season dealing with her father’s cancer battle. During the whole challenge, Amber stayed steady for her teammates and was a true leader. Amber goes out of her way to make a difference for young women that look up to her across the country. She never says no to an autograph and has even befriended some younger fans. One child from Amber’s hometown has received a special Christmas surprise from Amber the past two seasons. She answers every letter she receives and hopes her story can make a difference.

Community

Amber is a second degree black belt in Taekwondo. Her instructor credited her for continuing to model the Taekwondo tenants in her college and softball career. Every year during her Gophers career she has taken part in HopeKids and “Cookies with Santa.” The past two years, Amber has taken part in “Operation Christmas Child,” a nonprofit dedicated to supplying shoeboxes of toys to boys and girls around the world for the holidays.

Competition

Amber Fiser has already cemented herself as one of the top players in Gopher softball history and is making a case for one of the top players in all of NCAA softball going into the 2020 season. She is fifth all-time in program history in wins (72) and strikeouts (666). With UCLA’s Rachel Garcia taking an Olympic redshirt, Fiser is the NCAA active leader in strikeouts going into the season.

In 2019, Fiser was named a First Team NFCA All-American, was a Honda Cup Award Finalist, and was named the Big Ten Pitcher of the Year. She ranked third in the NCAA in wins, fifth in strikeouts, and 12th in ERA. Her 31 wins on the season tied for second all-time in program history and 346 strikeouts was third all-time. She set a school record and matched a conference record with six Big Ten Pitcher of the Week awards. She also picked up two NFCA Division I Pitcher of the Week awards.

Fiser hit double-digit strikeouts in 14 games including a career high 13 strikeouts five times. She also pitched four complete game one-hitters in 2019. She has thrown two no-hitters in her career, both in 2018. Her last one was a perfect game at Purdue on Apr. 27, 2018.

The Van Horne, Iowa native opens the season as the No. 7 ranked player on Softball America’s Top-100 list. She is also a Softball America Preseason All-American and was named to the USA Softball Top-50 Collegiate Player of the Year.