Ben’s Ford Christian School, a success story

Southern Sports & Travel

Sitting three miles just outside the small town of Bogalusa, Ben’s Ford Christian School is now in the closing weeks of the most successful school year in its’ history.

A ministry of Ben’s Ford Baptist Church, the school has blossomed in both growth and athletics and is now the biggest private school in Washington Parish. From just 20 students in 1983 to 500 today the MAIS member school has addressed their growth with improvements that include a newly constructed, spacious preschool building and a much needed field house for their athletic program.

With the growth came other changes. The school will, for the first time, compete in Class AA when the 2013/14 school year gets underway in August and will be in the same district as Bowling Green, just 18 miles away.

While capital improvements helped the school keep pace with its’ growing enrollment numbers the success of the athletic program reached new heights this year and created a level of excitement never seen at the school, now in its’ fourth decade. 
The boys’ varsity basketball program, under the direction of third year head coach Shadd Pittman, teetered just outside the Southern Sports & Travel rankings this past season.  Ben’s Ford caught fire in the playoffs and advanced to their first ever Class A South State Championship game where they fell to eventual state champion Porter’s Chapel. The Eagles finished the year at 18-11 and will have three starters returning next season.

The success of the basketball program carried over to baseball where Ben’s Ford yet again reached a milestone, its’ first ever district championship in any sport.

Now in his sixth season at the helm, head baseball coach Jerod Wascom remembers the difficulty in building a program that had fielded a team just once in its’ history, in 1991.

“My first year we only had a 10 or 12 game schedule and didn’t have a field,” said Wascom. “We were able to play one home game and it was played at Bogalusa high School.”

A larger obstacle was assembling a varsity team.

“Our biggest challenge was playing at the high school level with kids that hadn’t played baseball since 9 or 10 year old little league.”

Wascom had to start from scratch which meant teaching fundamentals and basics of the game in order to field a varsity team. Add a lack of numbers on the roster and the challenge was magnified tremendously.

Wascom had to incorporate kids one year removed from primary school to fill his roster and had three seventh graders playing infield positions at one time.

Although it was difficult in the early stages there was an upside which ultimately paid dividends and that was evident as those seventh graders received a steady dose of Baseball 101 as they progressed over the years.

The program has grown and improved since Wascom’s first season in 2007 and the Eagle baseball program enjoyed the fruits of their labor this season as they went a perfect 8-0 in district play, qualified for the post season and steadily crept up the Southern Sports & Travel rankings.

First and second round sweeps of Newton and ranked Russell Christian followed and Wascom attributed that to solid pitching from seniors Cole Edwards and Brian Hines. In their series wins over Newton and Russell Christian only 2 walks were allotted and Ben’s Ford pitchers racked up 37 strikeouts.

“It was a hurdle at the start of the season due to seven of my starters playing basketball and after a long playoff run I got them much later than usual.”

On the Thursday morning the team traveled to Meridian for game two against Russell Christian the entire school gave them an encouraging sendoff as students holding signs lined the fences of the front of the campus.

“The support from the school has been outstanding,” said Wascom. “We don’t have lights yet at our field so most of our home games start at 2 p.m. and all the kids are allowed to attend. It’s a great environment and our players love it.”

The support from the school and this season’s success has also reaped another reward, more interest from kids that chose not to participate in the program.

“We have some kids on campus that didn’t play baseball that could have helped us and now they’ve seen the comradery, the fun and the success we’ve had and they tell me they wished they had played, and since we only have three seniors, it’s encouraging for next season.”

Now playing for the Class A South State Championship, Ben’s Ford takes a major step up in competition as the Eagle’s opponent is the 2012 defending state champion Glenbrook Apaches and when asked if his players understood the moment they were in Wascom replied, “We try not to make it bigger than what it is, we don’t downplay it but we’ve been preaching all year that you play the game to have fun first and foremost but at the same time we want our kids to put forth their best effort.” 
Wascom added, “They know Glenbrook won state last season but we’ve been telling our kids all year that the potential is there if they come together and play hard, the sky is the limit for this group. Now that things have started coming together they realize what they’ve accomplished to this point but make no mistake about it, we know Glenbrook is second to none and it’s going to be a real tough task.”
Coaches at Ben’s Ford know and understand the challenge that awaits them as they move to Class AA athletics but it’s a welcomed challenge that they eagerly await.

“Success breeds success,” said Wascom. “Hopefully this will carry on from sport to sport for years to come. We have kids who are winners, they believe they can win and that’s the difference now.”

Ben’s Ford met defending Class A champion Glenbrook on Tuesday night in game one of the best of three series and witnessed up close and personal the play of one of the top pitchers in Class A. Glenbrook defeated Ben’s Ford 13-0 behind a perfect game hurled by sophomore Spencer White.

The series resumes on Thursday.
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Photos courtesy of Shelaine McClelland