Lady Wildcat basketball point guard Chelsey Ruise and the softball team's Taylor Crummey both signed commitments to attend area colleges recently.

Ms. Ruise will be taking her wealth of skills to Edward Waters College next year after signing a scholarship letter on Wednesday, May 2 in the BCHS Media Center.

The entire Lady Wildcats basketball team watched as Ruise penned the contract to join the Lady Tigers. EWC Coach Charmaine Wilson was in attendance and praised Ruise for skills on and off the court.

“I really liked how Coach (Aaron) Summers talked about Chelsey’s leadership and how the team was a family. That’s what we are at EWC, we’re a family,” said Wilson.

Wilson will be entering her second year as EWC head coach and Ruise is expected to step right in and make an impact.

“We brought her in for a workout and they felt that she can come in and do something on the court that they’ve been really needing,” said her father, Wildcat boys’ head coach Charles Ruise. “If she reports in shape and ready to work they think she can have an instant impact.”

Ruise certainly had an impact this season for Summers’ Cats. She was the team’s top scorer with 410 points and a 22-point per game average. But she had more to do on the court than just score.

On the ground (from right) Rashodd Hadley Darius Green, Drew Rogers and Hunter Chambers.

Coach Ryan Sulkowski will be wearing a new hat as the Baker Wildcats launch the first week of spring football practice.

Sulkowski has taken over the middle school program for the spring.

“It will be exciting to see 175 kids on our practice field,” said Sulkowski. He is handling the middle school team while they look for a head coach to replace George McDuffie. Sulkowski likes the opportunity that gives him.

“We are making the middle school and high school program a seamless unit,” said the new Bobcats coach.

Danny Green did something similar during his tenure as Wildcat head coach. Though he didn’t go so far as to take over the middle school program, he installed the high school playbook on the middle school level. Green felt it enabled the middle schoolers to already have a working knowledge of the Wildcat playbook when they entered BCHS.

Shelby Gatto slides into home.

The Lady Wildcat softball team won the district title with wins over Terry Parker and Paxon.

Haley Crews struck out six and allowed only two hits as BCHS defeated the Parker Braves 15-1 on Thursday, April 17. Crews had a strong effort from the mound and backed it up by going 4 of 4 from the plate.

BCHS jumped on top 7-0 in the first innings. Doubles from Crews and Shelby Gatto helped the Cats to an early lead. Crews, Tina Hauge, Gatto, Kylie Holton, Clara Harvey, Taylor Crummey and Tayler McCann all scored.

The Cats got a run from Holton in the second and a pair from Crews and Hauge in the third to stretch their lead to 10-0.

Coach Jon Mobley with players during the conference championship in Madison.

When it counted, the Baker County Middle School Bobcats came through last week to clinch both division and conference crowns.

It was crunch time for the Lady Bobcat softball team that had to win a playoff in Live Oak on April 10 to make it to the Star Conference Championship on Thursday, April 12 in Madison.

Coach Jon Mobley’s Cats had an edge in the three-team playoff. They had a first round bye and so would only have to play the winner of the Lake City/Live Oak game.

Mobley and his girls watched as those two rival teams went back in forth, battling in a tight contest. Suwannee defeated Lake City 8-7 and the home team had a lot of momentum going into their match with BCMS.