Corresponding with their summer league games, Vicksburg High School held their summer camp Saturday afternoon, helping kids from 1st grade through 6th grade.

VHS head coach Brian Ellis, assistant coach Hugh Guest, current players and former players from VHS, conducted the camp.

According to Ellis, the main focuses of the camp were to improve on the fundamentals of softball, hitting, pitching, fielding and more basic aspects of the game. What Ellis wanted his campers to focus on the most, however, was having fun.

“I like seeing the kids improve and trying to make it a fun camp,” Ellis said. “Seeing all the girls improve and have fun was very important to me.”

The camp was split up into two groups Saturday. The 1st-3rd-grade group began early in the morning and the 4th-6th-grade group followed up after that. There wasn’t much disparity between the two groups as both groups of campers showed improvement in their fundamentals.

“That’s what I really wanted to see in the end and I’m happy my campers had fun improving,” Ellis said.

The VHS softball team is also in the home stretch of their summer league where they will wrap up the summer season Thursday night on the road at Brandon.

According to Ellis, it has been a learning experience so far this summer as the team has shown its inexperience, but has shown improvements over the course of the summer.

“We’re young and inexperienced as far as the varsity level goes,” Ellis said. “We’re just trying to get the pace of the game right.”

The varsity softball team returns seven seniors, one junior, four sophomores and five players in junior high. Inexperience is up and down the lineup for the Gators softball team. That leaves a lot of room for improvement by the time the real season rolls around.

By the time the summer league ends, Ellis wants to see his team improve offensively and with fundamentals.

“Getting reps and playing time in summer league is important for me and the players,” Ellis said. “We need to put the bat on the ball more and need to hit the ball harder.”

With the summer league ending Thursday, there is still room for improvement.

“I want to see our team compete and react to the flow of the game better,” Ellis said. “I want improvement in the end.”