High school softball teams back in the circle

LEESBURG — Both Worth County’s Kaleb Hathcock and Lee County’s Dwayne Suggs are getting plenty of opportunity to see their younger players in action.

The head coaches of their respective schools’ softball programs had plenty of work to do with their rosters during the offseason following highly successful seasons last year.

Tuesday, those teams met at Lee County, with the host Trojans winning 8-0 in five innings.

“We’ve got eight juniors, four sophomores and two freshmen on the team this year, no seniors at all,” said Suggs, whose team won the GHSA Region 1-6A title last year. “We have a group that played well as sophomores last year, and they’ve come back. We’re going to start seven or eight juniors this year and a couple of sophomores, and we think they’re going to come through this year.”

Both teams are working new players in, an ongoing process just two weeks into the season. In Hathcock’s case, Worth County had to replace a strong nucleus of six seniors that led the Rams to a third-place finish in last year’s GHSA Class 3A Elite Eight.

At this point, Lee County is a little bit ahead on the calendar. The Trojans played in a weekend event last weekend in Columbus in which they played three games, giving the entire roster plenty of work. Worth County has its first weekend competition this weekend at the Watermelon Tournament in Cordele after playing its opener last week.

“It’s a process, and the girls are buying into it,” Hathcock said. “We have three returning starters from last year, so there’s a lot of new faces in the lineup. Our seniors are doing a good job of leading the team, getting the girls where they’re supposed to be.”

In Tuesday’s contest, Lee County put two runs up in the first inning, holding that lead until breaking things open in the fourth with a six-run inning.

Lee County pitcher Julianna Franklin threw a complete game two-hitter, striking out four and walking two. Abbey Adkins was the pitcher of record for Worth County.

Karlee Back paced the Lee County offense with two runs scored and a double.

Taylor White had a double for Worth County (0-2), who plays Lanier County and Taylor County on Friday in Cordele.

Lee County (4-2) is at Colquitt County today and will play in the Georgia Dugout Club Leadoff Classic on Saturday in Kennesaw.