MOULTRIE – With the majority of its non-Region 1-6A portion of the schedule complete, the Colquitt County softball team is hoping the growing pains of the first 10 games of the season will pay off.

The Lady Packers will open region play with a single game against Richmond Hill at 4 p.m. Tuesday at Packer Park with a doubleheader at the Wildcats home field on Thursday to complete the series.

“Our kids are excited about the opportunity to get into region play,” first-year coach Taylor Barber said of his underclassmen-laden team. “You can tell the energy level is starting to kick in.”

The girls split their first 10 games of the season as they adapted to a new coach and a roster that featured just two seniors who have had extensive varsity experience.

“The record is not indicative of how much they’ve grown,” said Barber, who was not named to succeed Chance Pitts as head coach until late June. “It was an odd situation. The kids were expecting Chance, then they got me and although we didn’t change too much, the tempo certainly changed.

“But they have been awesome.”

Center fielder RaJayla McBride and second baseman Libby Wetherington are the only two full-time senior starters who are back from the team that went 20-12 last year.

“We’ve had some growing pains,” Barber said. “I think they have tried to do the things that the teams that came before them did.

“They needed to find their own niche and they are in the process of doing that now.”

Barber took his team to Cobb County for three games last weekend to help prepare for the start of region play.

The Lady Packers defeated Sequoyah 6-2 in their first game on Friday, then lost to Houston County 3-2 in a game in which they held the Lady Bears scoreless after the first inning.

“On Friday, we played well against two really good teams,” Barber said.

Against the top team in the state on Saturday morning, Colquitt fell 12-3 to North Paulding and took a 5-5 record into Monday’s non-region game at Cairo, that was rained out.

The Lady Packers have used juniors Kamry Paulk, Peyton Arrington and sophomore Lilah Thompson in the circle.

Paulk is 2-1 with a save and a 1.84 ERA. Arrington is 2-2 and Thompson is 1-2.

Arrington leads the Lady Packers in hitting with a .500 batting average. She has four extra base hits and also leads the team with nine runs driven in.

McBride, Colquitt’s leadoff batter, is hitting .379.

Montana Tatum, a senior who missed much of last year because of an injury, is hitting .364.

Richmond Hill will bring a 4-5 record to Moultrie on Tuesday after being shut out 4-0 by Coffee at home on Monday.

It was the second straight loss for the Lady Wildcats, who had won their previous four games in a row.

Richmond Hill was 10-17 overall and 4-7 in the region last year

An intriguing region-opening series starts on Tuesday in Tifton, where the Lady Devils will play host to Lowndes.

The 5-3 Vikettes were 22-8 overall and won the region last year with a 10-1 record.

But Tift County, the team that Barber coached the last five seasons, is 6-2 and ranked No. 9 in Class 6A by Score Atlanta.

Tift has defeated Cook, Class 2A’s No. 5 team; LaGrange, No. 5 in 3A; and Emanuel County Institute, No. 8 in Class A Division II.

Valdosta (2-3) will travel to Kingsland on Tuesday to open its three-game series with Camden County (6-4).

“We are ready to play some games that count,” Barber said.