Middle Georgia has big influence in softball tournament

The games are in west Georgia, in Columbus, but there's certainly a large Middle Georgia flavor to the GHSA softball Elite Eight.

Games start at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday at the Columbus Softball Complex south of downtown.

And that's when six of the 11 Middle Georgia teams will begin their quest. Class A gets going first, with Class AA and AAA and 2:30 p.m., Class AAAA and Class AAAAA at 4:15 p.m. and Class AAAAAA at 6 p.m., respectively. The tournament is double elimination.

GMC opens defense of its Class A public school title against Echols County in a battle of No. 4 vs. No. 6, according to ScoreAtlanta's final regular-season poll.

The Bulldogs hope to take advantage of the move up to Class AA after the 2013-14 year by Gordon Lee, which had won four straight state titles in Class A, before and after the split.

The Class AAAAA field is grateful, at least temporarily, to Jones County, which ended the season of top-ranked Cambridge in the second round. The oddity of that series was that all three games were shutouts.

But the Greyhounds will see plenty of familiar faces, with Region 2-AAAAA rivals Houston County and Greenbrier in the field. Third-ranked Greenbrier, which has broken the Bears' hearts more than once in recent years, is the defending champion and opens with No. 2 Chapel Hill. And if the Bears and Greyhounds win, they'll meet at 7:45 p.m. on Thursday.

The Greyhounds won the 2010 title in Class AAAA, knocking off top-five teams in Columbus, going undefeated and beating Greenbrier twice.

Veterans and West Laurens are also Region 2-AAAA rivals, representing the area after a drought in the class last year. Veterans is still a young program, but the Raiders are making their fifth fast-pitch Elite Eight trip since 2009, with two third-place finishes.

Vidalia is certainly a favorite in Class AA. The 31-3 Indians are ranked second and outscored two opponents 46-7 in four games in setting a program record for wins. They went 2-2 last year, getting knocked out by eventual runner-up Gordon Lee 3.2

Wilcox County is back under second-year head coach Stephen McDuffie, and takes with it a .341 average and nine homers. And it's a familiar first-round matchup. Telfair County and Wilcox County opened up last year against each other, with Telfair County winning 11-10. They met again, with the Patriots getting revenge 9-2 before being GMC's 11-2 victim in the championship game.

And they're region rivals. Telfair County is in the Elite Eight for the fourth straight year.

Tattnall Square, FPD and Stratford -- all ranked in the top 7 -- help make sure Middle Georgia's odds are decent to at least reach a championship game, with 38 percent of the Class A fields coming from the area.

The only classification not represented by a Middle Georgia team is Class AAA. No area schools compete in Class AAAAAA

This story was originally published October 28, 2015 at 10:42 PM with the headline "Middle Georgia has big influence in softball tournament ."