The Locust Grove Lady Wildcats softball team has done what no other team in any sport at a Henry County public school has accomplished – and they got the unexpected joy of doing it on their home field.

  Because of torrential rains the weekend of October 24-26 at the Columbus softball complex, where the top eight teams in each Georgia High School Association classification gather every fall to play for the state championship, the title game could not be completed on Saturday afternoon as is customary. Instead, the GHSA made the call to wrap things up the following Monday and Locust Grove was able to be the host by virtue of being the lone unbeaten team in the AAAAA bracket.

  The win gave the Lady Wildcats a final 2019 record of 33-2 and a third consecutive AAAAA state championship. A number of county teams in various sports have gone all the way, and a couple have done it twice in a row, but a three-peat has never happened in a team sport. Only a handful of individual wrestlers and track athletes have managed that.

  Head coach Chris Davis called the climactic scene at Locust Grove “surreal” and was thrilled that his players had the opportunity.

  “It’s never happened before [playing for the title at home] because softball has always been played at a complex,” he said. “This is the first time in the state a team has been to play on its home field.”

  With the way the championship game was interrupted so suddenly due to rain, and with his team in the lead, Davis feared it would put a literal damper on the girls’ big moment. But the game was finished in perfect weather within two days, with a boisterous home crowd that came out to cheer them on.

  “It allowed an opportunity for the girls to celebrate,” said Davis. “I would have hated for them to lose that moment, of just getting that last out.”

  Davis has coached the team for all 11 years of its existence, since the school opened in the fall of 2009. The inaugural season is the only time his squad has not reached the state playoffs, starting in AAA and then moving to AAAA for a couple of years before its first AAAAA season in 2016.

  The Lady Wildcats made their first trip to Columbus in 2011 and also reached the round of 16 in 2010, 2013 and 2014. This year’s senior class – Layla Barron, Kelly Kight and Emmalee Smith – has a four-year record of 117-20.

  The remainder of the roster includes juniors Brooke McCubbin, Katie Parker, Haleigh Henry; sophomores Jamison Brockenbrough, Skylar Elkins, Sanam Shaikh, and Tagen Levao; and freshmen Madi Speaks, Summer McCranie, Bella Mor-ton, Kendall Rowlands, and Tannah Wilson.

  The previous two state championship teams lost seven players each to graduation. This time there are only three, which has Davis excited for 2020 and beyond. “Next year we will be retuning as many as we have during the past two-year stretch,” he said.

  At least 20 players coached by Davis have signed to play softball in college, including ten from those 2017 and 2018 teams alone.