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ABOUT
Emma Davis is an accomplished outfielder for Steven Locke’s AP Gold 16U travel ball team and was rated as the #43rd outfielder and #112 overall in the most recent Class of 2022 rankings.
From Grayson, Georgia, she has been a three-year starter and as a sophomore and junior earned 1st Team All-Region and All-County honors as well as All-State honorable mention.
This fall, she helped Grayson High finish 3rd in the Georgia 7A playoffs and, despite missing six games because of COVID, hit .467 mostly in the leadoff spot with a .495 OPB, 32 runs scored and 27 steals.
On the club front, she helped the AP Gold team—#25 in the Extra Elite Eighty 16U Club Rankings—win the Triple Crown Southeast Nationals this summer and had a key RBI single in an exciting 9-8 walk-off win in the bottom of the 9th inning to beat Tennessee Mojo. In 2019, the athlete helped Grayson finish 2nd in the Georgia 7A state finals and went 7-for-15 in the state tournament.
“What sets Emma apart is her instincts,” Coach Locke told Extra Inning Softball. “In the outfield, she is the best at reading the ball off the bat and at tracking a ball down in the gap. Offensively, she can lay a bunt down with best of the them or drive a gap for average. Emma has full ownership of what she does at the plate depending on how she sees the defense is set up.”
In this crazy year of recruiting impacted by COVID blocking coaches from going out to see players and athletes prevented from in-person contacts with recruiters, it’s made it much tougher for those 2021 and ’22 grads, but Emma’s story has a happy ending.
Here’s her recruiting story as told by her father, John Davis, who is also an assistant on the AP Gold team…
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As Emma is a 2022 grad, we started the recruiting efforts early, in 6th and 7th grade, as that was what was happening four years ago (prior to the Early Recruiting Rules going into effect in April of 2018). We camped many places, sent many emails… all of that.
She is fortunate to be on a very strong team in AP Gold Locke, previously Glory Adkins Locke. She was part of that first team that consolidated as a first year 14U team so we are in the middle of our fifth year here. I have been assistant coach during that same time frame. She is a late 03 birthday so most of her teammates are ’21 grads.
We are not from Georgia so some of the colleges in this region were new to us. One of her teammates, Kendall Huelsman (a ’21 grad), was engaged with College of Charleston during her recruiting.
I knew the coaches were watching Kendall and had heard great things about the school but we never researched it or attended any camps. I don’t recall them ever expressing interest in Emma or we would have likely engaged with them.
She already had a very high level D2 offer and received a phone call on Sept. 1, 2020 from a rising ACC program. Then, in early September, Steven said that CofC wanted to talk to Emma. This came as a big surprise to us!
“It was interesting to be called by College of Charleston because I had never been to the school before,” says Emma. “They saw me play last year and also caught some of my Twitter videos.”
She did a series of phone and Zoom calls with the coaching staff and we started researching the school and program. It looked promising. Later that month they made an offer.
Because her high school season is in the fall and my wife is a teacher, it was very difficult to find time to make the trip. We scheduled a weekend to the campus in early October to see the school.
As you know, this wasn’t a visit and we could not engage the coaching staff; however, four days before the trip, Emma and two teammates caught COVID. The trip was cancelled and her younger sister Lily, a 2026 playing for East Cobb Bullets – Colvin, was devastated as we were going away for her 13th birthday.
Fortunately for us, the virus was only an inconvenience to our family and had no significant ramifications.
Ultimately, we took the trip in November after the high school season was over. We could not do an organized tour because of COVID and the fact that she is a junior. We did a self-tour and Emma really liked it.
“COVID made it challenging because I couldn’t see the whole school or talk to coaches face-to-face,” Emma adds. “There were also many unknowns with all of the other schools in the recruiting processes.”
We met so many great people with a handful of personal experiences to make her feel at home. In the afternoon we watched a practice and, although we could not engage them in any way, we still got to see the players, their personalities, energy, and the coaching staff instructing.
“The coaches at the College of Charleston were very understanding and patient,” adds Emma, “It was even more difficult because we were in our school season. Plus, I wanted to see the campus but I tested positive for COVID which pushed our trip back. We did get to do our own self-guided tour and we were lucky they were practicing on the day we drove to the field.”
After practice we took the 5-minute drive to the beach before we headed home. I’m fairly certain Emma made her decision then but she waited a week or so with a few more phone calls to work out the details.
“I selected College of Charleston because the players we watched in practice were so positive and motivated,” Emma concluded. “Plus the campus and the people we met were amazing and the size of the school felt like a good fit for me.”
It was not what was expected when she envisioned the process but she rolls with the punches and keeps focusing on her goals!
I am excited to announce that I have committed to further my softball career and education at the College of Charleston. I am thankful for this opportunity and to the coaches and teammates that have helped me. I couldn’t be here without y’all. Go Cougs!! 🐾 @CofCSoftball pic.twitter.com/xao0IY1Q8n
— Emma Davis (@emmadavis1010) November 12, 2020