Vicksburg High’s softball past, present and most recent will descend upon its toddler-aged field Saturday.

Through the creative idea from Missy Gators’ fast-pitch coach Brian Ellis, was born the school’s first alumni softball game, which will take place Saturday at 6 p.m. at the school’s three-year-old Softball Swamp Field. The festivities will include a home run derby and a game featuring former and current players. Players who haven’t already signed up are welcome to do so before the game.

Classes from as early as 1997 up through 2016 will be in attendance and play on a field that was once merely an empty lot belonging to the city. The Missy Gators have played two fast- and slow-pitch seasons on their new field and continue to renovate its surrounding areas.

This isn’t the first time in Ellis’ career that he’s hosted a game where former students come back to play.

“Just from playing in alumni games in the past and putting them on, it’s always fun and get you get enough of a laugh. Even those older ones surprise you, they still have that competitiveness,” Ellis said.

A lot of stories will be shared among players and even Ellis, who didn’t get a chance to see a lot of them play at the high school level. Fast-pitch softball became a varsity sport at Vicksburg High in 1999, and Ellis was hired as coach in 2013. The slow-pitch program pre-dates the fast-pitch team by a number of years.

“It’s going to be fun for me,” Ellis said. “Meeting the ones that I didn’t have an opportunity to coach and hearing some of the stuff from the past.”

The home run derby will kick things off. Players will get three outs — anything other than a home run — and the winner is whoever hits the most balls over the fence before reaching the outs limit.

For the game itself, teams are split based upon graduation year — odd years versus even. It’s an opportunity for current coaches to welcome players and talk about their good times as a Gator and thank them for what they’ve accomplished.

A total of 22 players have signed up so far. After a few moments of the flyer being posted to Facebook, it spread through the social networking site to reach those interested.

Ellis’ decision to split his younger, recently graduated players was to help create a more competitive advantage between the teams.

“Right now it’s matched up pretty good, evenly number wise,” Ellis said. “I think I have 22 ladies that are on the list right now. I think it’s like 10 and 12, which is probably a good thing. You don’t want to end up with all your younger ones together because it kind of creates an unfairness.”

VHS ALUMNI SOFTBALL GAME

Vicksburg High’s softball program will host an alumni home run derby and all-star game Saturday at 6 p.m. All former VHS fast- and slow-pitch players are welcome to play. There is a $20 fee to play, and registration begins at 5 p.m. Admission for fans is $2. All proceeds benefit the VHS softball program.