Friday night was a special night at Davidson Field for the Italy varsity baseball team in more ways than one. Presentations of special guests included the seniors of the varsity team and Loyd Davidson, previous coach of the Italy Gladiator Baseball team for 7 years (1987-1994).

Also, the last game of the district proved to be another testimony on how great these kids play ball. With the determination of the coaches and players, the Gladiators finished their season undefeated-one of the goals head coach Matt Coker set for this year.

Mr. Davidson was a longtime employee for Italy ISD before his retirement. He began in 1973. His passion for sports was evident and drove the Gladiator football team wherever they needed to play. That driving and enthusiasm lasted over 20 years for Davidson. During this time, he coached his son and numerous other local athletes in little league baseball.

In the meantime, he encouraged the administration to restart the baseball program at Italy High School. In 1987, that dream was realized as Italy ISD began playing baseball again and, as with football, where Italy baseball went, so did Loyd Davidson. However, in a different capacity. This time he was helping with coaching duties and did so for 7 years. During this tenure, Italy Baseball went to the play-offs several times.

In 1998, the Italy ISD administration decided that because of his passion and love for baseball, they would develop and name the field after Loyd Davidson. This field was built by the maintenance crew but Davidson oversaw the project every step of the way. Loyd Davidson was honored Friday night by the coaches, teams, friends and family. He ceremoniously threw the first pitch for the game and, of course, it was a strike.

Josh Milligan, Ivan Roldan, Dan Crownover, Oscar Gonzalez and Desmond Anderson ran onto the field with their heads held high Friday night. Not only are they a member of the varsity baseball team that are 1-A District Champions but they played their last game of baseball on this field as seniors of Italy High School. Each were proud in their own way as they battled through the last game against Avalon. There were only 3 innings in this game with the final score Italy 18, Avalon 2.

Jase Holden began the pitching for this game and did an awesome job. He only allowed one Eagle to score in the top of the 1st inning. In the bottom of the first, the Gladiators faced two different pitchers for Avalon. The Eagles just couldn’t seem to get it right. However, in this inning the Gladiators scored 11 points until they moved on to the top of the 2nd inning, which saw Avalon strike out three times in a row and the bottom of the 2nd inning quickly came into view. Seven more points added to the Italy board totaled 18 points.

Coach Coker brought in a new pitcher, Desmond Anderson, as a request from the senior. “He has been asking me to do this for three years and I thought it was a good time to let him have this opportunity on the mound,” Coker commented. “He did great. I may have to let him pitch in the play-offs too. I just might have created a monster,” Coker said with a smile.

In asking coach Craig Bales what he thought about the advancement of the team, he said, “Being district champs is huge. Anytime you win the ‘golden glove,’ in anything, it’s a big deal. I feel they will carry this momentum into play-offs and make a deep run.”

Coach Coker is especially proud of these young men. He said, “Going 1-18 to 12-0 in a 2 year span is totally unbelievable. I am very proud of these boys. We could have lost focus after we won the district-but we never did. We came in here and took care of business. I would like to thank the parents for their support and the players themselves for working so hard. Jase and Desmond did a great job on the mound tonight.”

“Now, the real season begins. We need to continue to stay focused. There will bigger and better competition coming. We can go out winners and I will be waiting for that cooler of water they (the team) can dump on me in Round Rock. Let’s go get ’em!”

Coker has some practice games lined up for the team before play-offs begin in the second week of May. These will be announced as soon as the dates are confirmed. Congratulations, Gladiators!