High school spring playoffs begin this week with esports, slow-pitch softball

Here’s a look at the 10 sports that will decide their champions over the next six weeks.

Esports: Playoffs begin Monday to determine the four teams in each game that will advance to the state championships, to be held April 26 at the Bartow County Schools Esports Arena in Cartersville. This season’s games are Splatoon, NBA2K, Madden and Rocket League (4A-6A and A-3A). Fall season champions included North Gwinnett (League of Legends), Lowndes (Mario Kart 8), Brookwood (5A-6A Smash), East Forsyth (3A-4A Smash) and Mount Vernon (A-2A Smash).

Slow-pitch softball: The all-classification, double-elimination state tournament will be played Wednesday and Thursday at Twin Creeks Softball Complex in Woodstock. Defending state champion Creekview and 2022 winner Haralson County will be among the teams competing in first-round games. They have combined to win five of the seven championships since the sport was revived in 2017 after a seven-year hiatus. Recent champions West Laurens (2023) and Hart County (2021) are also in the 16-team field. Previous state tournaments have included just eight teams.

Soccer: The first of five rounds in the eight classifications begins April 22 with girls games in classes A Division II, 4A, 5A and 6A, followed by the boys in those classes the next night. Championship games will be played May 13-15 at McEachern High School for boys and girls in A Division I, 3A and 6A; May 14-16 at Duluth High School in 3A-A private, 4A and 5A; and May 15-16 at Mercer University in A Division II and 2A. Girls championship games each night begin at 5 p.m., with the boys to follow at 7:30.

Gymnastics: The state preliminaries and championships will be April 23-25 at Buford Arena. Individual and team championships will be crowned in two divisions — classes A-4A and 5A-6A. Preliminaries on April 23 will begin at 2:30 p.m. for A-4A teams and 6:30 for 5A-6A teams. The championships will begin at 6:30 p.m. April 25. The gymnastics competition was an all-classification event until splitting into two divisions in 2019. North Oconee has won five consecutive titles in the smaller-school division, and Buford has won three straight in the higher division.

Baseball: These championships will mark the final GHSA athletic events of the academic year. The finals will be played May 19-21 at Georgia Southern, May 19-22 at the Rome Emperors’ AdventHealth Stadium and May 19-22 at the Gwinnett Stripers’ Coolray Field. The exact schedule will be set later. The first of five rounds of playoffs in each of the eight classes begins April 23, with one round each week leading up to the finals. All matchups in each round will consist of a best-of-three series.

Tennis: The regular season comes to an end Friday, and the playoffs begin next week with 16 boys and 16 girls matches in each of the eight classifications. First-round matches are to be completed by April 24. Other completion dates are April 29 for the second round, May 5 for the quarterfinals and May 10 for the semifinals. Championship matches will be played May 10 at the Rome Tennis Center at Berry College.

Lacrosse: The regular season ends April 26, and the first of five playoff rounds will begin April 28. There will be three 24-team brackets for both boys and girls, loosely based on enrollment. Division 3 will consist of the largest schools, with Division 2 and Division 1 made up of smaller schools. The championship games will be played May 16-17 at Denmark High School. The schedule for May 16 will include the Division 3 girls at 5:30 p.m., followed by the boys at 7:30. On May 17, the Division 1 girls will play at noon, followed by the Division 2 girls at 2, Division 1 boys at 4 and Division 2 boys at 6.

Bass fishing: The fifth annual state championship in the sport will be held May 3 at Lake Lanier in Gainesville. Winners of the qualifying tournaments held in February, March and early April were Hoyt English and Jake Grantham of Coffee, Maddox Ferrell and Finley Edwards of South Forsyth, and Nolan Holloway and Ben Lanford of Morgan County. The 2024 winning team was West Laurens’ Ryan Soles and James Brooks, who caught five fish weighing a total of 20 pounds, 12 ounces. They will be among the more than 100 two-person teams that qualified this year.

Track and field: Boys and girls championships will be held May 9-10 at Rome’s Barron Stadium (A Division I and 5A), Albany’s Hugh Mills Stadium (A Division II and 3A), East Jackson High School (2A and 4A) and Carrollton High School (Adapted, 3A-A Private and 6A). The regular season will end April 26, with sectionals the following weekend that will determine the state qualifiers. Westminster’s boys and girls swept state championships in their classification last season for the second time in three years.

Golf: The state championships in eight classes will be played at 11 sites May 19-20. Class 6A boys and girls will compete at Kinderlou Forest Golf Club in Valdosta. Class 5A will play at Pine Lakes Golf Course in Jekyll Island (boys) and Sea Island Retreat Golf Course in St. Simons Island (girls). Class 4A will be hosted by Governors Towne Club in Acworth (boys) and Bentwater Golf Club in Acworth (girls). Highland Country Club in LaGrange will host the Class 3A boys and girls. Class 2A boys will play at Bull Creek East Golf Course in Midland (boys) and Maple Ridge Golf Club in Columbus (girls). Boys and girls from the other three classes will play at Arrowhead Pointe Golf Club in Elberton (class A Division I), Bartram Trail Golf Club in Evans (class A Division II) and Twin City Country Club in Tennille (Class 3A-A private). Qualifying sectionals and region/area tournaments must be completed by May 6.