Montana Davidson has been associated with the Mississippi State softball team longer than Samantha Ricketts has.
Ricketts, in her second year as MSU’s head softball coach, first became an assistant under Vann Stuedeman in 2015. She was named associate head coach in July 2018 and took over the program a year later.
But Ricketts still can’t match the longevity of Davidson, the team’s redshirt senior third baseman. The North Carolina native first committed to play for Mississippi State in the summer of 2013, enrolled in 2016 and is now in her fifth year on the roster.
A lot of that time wasn’t easy. Davidson’s time at MSU has been marred by injury and disappointment. She lost her opportunity, her health and her friend.
Still, Davidson is a Bulldog — and could be, in fact, for another year and a half. And now, as Mississippi State’s 2021 season gets underway, she’s feeling better than ever as she continues to make her mark in Starkville.
“She’s definitely a key piece to our success,” Ricketts said.
‘She’s going to go here’
Davidson’s parents, Eddie and Christina, always wanted Montana and her sister Mia to stay close to home.
With Chapel Hill just 15 minutes away from their home in Hillsborough, the Davidsons hoped their daughters would choose to be Tar Heels. The sisters attended a softball clinic at the University of North Carolina every Monday, and the family had formed a good relationship with longtime coach Donna J. Papa.
But as their recruitments took off, Montana and Mia had bigger goals. Their parents knew it was just a matter of time.
When Montana Davidson stepped on Mississippi State’s campus for the first time as a seventh-grader, she loved it. In her parents’ eyes, she could see a feeling of pride in their daughter’s accomplishments — and sadness at giving up the dream of keeping her near.
“You could just see my parents thinking, ‘Crap, she’s going to go here,'” Davidson said.
Along with Mia, she committed to Mississippi State on June 16, 2013, the summer after her freshman year. She enrolled in fall 2016, a year before Mia came to town.
That extra season of experience, according to Ricketts, let Davidson help her younger sister adjust to starting all 61 games as a freshman in 2018. When Mia was slumping at the plate or struggling with her confidence, her sister was there.
“Mia can’t do it by herself,” Ricketts said.
Restart
Davidson played in just six games and had just nine at-bats during her freshman season in 2017, but she was ready to compete for a starting role the following year.
She never got the chance.
That fall, just before the team traveled to Chipola College in Florida, Davidson dislocated her kneecap while taking a swing in practice. She decided to undergo physical therapy to rehab the injury, hoping she’d be back to full strength in a few weeks.
Instead, things only got worse. Davidson popped her kneecap out of place again and again, and she was never able to get back to where she’d been.
After winter break, with the injury still not healed, she went to see a doctor. Ultimately, Davidson decided on surgery to fix the issue once and for all. She chose to take a medical redshirt year and sit out the 2018 season, wresting her from the friends and teammates in her graduating class.
“It was a pretty tough decision,” Davidson said. “Once you ask for that redshirt, yeah, you’re still with your class, but you’re not really with your class anymore.”
The choice meant she’d end up in her sister’s class instead. Davidson said that while getting the chance to end her career alongside Mia didn’t fully dull the hurt of her injury, it certainly helped.
“At the end of the day, we started softball together, and now we get to finish it together,” Davidson said.
In a January 2018 procedure at the Columbus Orthopaedic Clinic, Davidson had part of her hamstring used to reconstruct her medial patellofemoral ligament. The injury was repaired — but at the cost of Davidson’s sophomore season. The progress she’d made since coming to Starkville, she told herself, was lost.
“I’m going to have to start all over.”
The bigger picture
One day, soon after her surgery, Davidson sat at home, alone. Her two roommates and most of the team were out working at a softball camp, but Davidson, still recovering, couldn’t go.
Then her phone lit up with a text. Alex Wilcox, a freshman teammate, wanted to know if Davidson needed anything. Wilcox drove the few miles from her dorm just to pick up Davidson and take her to lunch.
It was one of the best memories Davidson had with Wilcox, who battled ovarian cancer during her time at Mississippi State and became a national sensation. Wilcox died at age 18 on June 25, 2018, after just one season with the Bulldogs.
“She was a fighter, and she kept fighting until the day she passed,” Davidson said.
Ricketts said seeing what Wilcox was going through helped Davidson put the difficulty of missing the season into perspective.
“She knew she was on the sidelines for a year for an injury,” Ricketts said. “Alex’s was a little bit bigger, more big picture.”
During Wilcox’s only season on the team, the Bulldogs spent the weekends together, going out for meals and cherishing each other’s company. In that time, Davidson and Wilcox formed a strong bond.
But because of her injury, Davidson couldn’t always be with her teammate on the field. That wasn’t easy to deal with.
“I think the hardest part to me was knowing that it was the only year I got to play with her, and I missed some of the games she played,” Davidson said, choking up.
Wilcox’s name, memory and trademark smile live on within the Mississippi State program. The team wears teal jerseys for ovarian cancer awareness in every midweek game, hosts the annual Snowman tournament (a reference to Wilcox’s No. 8) and plays with Wilcox in their thoughts and on their minds every time the Bulldogs step onto the field.
“We get to play softball, and we get to play for someone who loved this game,” Davidson said. “We get to play for her, we get to win for her, and we get to do something that she would be loving to do right now, but she’s in a better place.”
Perhaps fittingly, Davidson’s reclassification meant she actually ended up being a part of Wilcox’s graduating class. And even when that group moves on, Wilcox’s memory will remain.
“She will always be with us,” Davidson said.
Vanishing act
Even with Wilcox there to help, Davidson didn’t feel like herself for a long time after her surgery.
Unable to work out every day, she gained weight. She began to lose confidence in her body.
Before she was medically cleared to take the field, she tried to push her way onto it.
“I was like, ‘When am I going to play? When am I going to play? When am I going to play?'” Davidson recalled.
In 2019, her redshirt sophomore season, Davidson managed to get back on the field. She started all 58 games at third base, hitting .269 with seven doubles. The Bulldogs ended Southeastern Conference play by winning five of their final six games and were eventually eliminated by host Washington in NCAA Regional play.
When the 2020 season started, Davidson and her teammates felt ready to surpass the prior season. By the time of their March 11 game at Southern Miss, everyone was rounding into form. Mia hit two home runs against the Golden Eagles and came a triple short of the cycle; fellow slugger Fa Leilua continued to heat up. Mississippi State won its 14th straight game.
That night, the first case of COVID-19 in Mississippi was recorded in Forrest County, where the Bulldogs had just played. The following afternoon, Mississippi State’s season was suspended.
It never resumed.
“This was the year,” the dismayed Bulldogs told themselves, “and it just vanished.”
Getting comfortable
Three days later, Davidson and her sister piled their belongings and their dogs, Kobe and Lulu, into their car. They drove northeast to North Beach, Maryland, where their parents now live — a 14-hour jaunt — and tried to come to terms with the season they had just lost.
“Once we got home, we were like, ‘There’s nothing we can do about it,'” Davidson said. “We had to control the controllables, and we just did what we needed to do to be ready for whatever.”
For Davidson, that meant making healthier choices when it came to eating, drinking and exercise. Used to going out for Mexican food and more when the team was together in Starkville, she no longer had that option 900 miles away and with most restaurants closed. Davidson cut out fried foods, cut down on her soda intake and cooked more meals with her family.
She stayed in softball shape, too. Davidson did home workouts suggested by graduate assistant Nicole Pendley, and she and Mia talked Eddie into front-tossing for them daily at a small field nearby. Once, Mia fashioned a log into an impromptu dumbbell for the sisters to hoist.
“We improvised a lot,” Davidson said.
When the team returned to Nusz Park for its seven-week fall season, Davidson felt better than she ever had since her injury. She lost weight and gained confidence.
“I think it’s me just feeling comfortable in my body again,” Davidson said.
‘Make it tough’
All fall, the numbers backed up Davidson’s newfound resolve.
At the plate, she increased the maximum distance she could launch softballs by 43 feet; her current mark of 262 feet trails only Mia and Leilua. She improved her maximum exit velocity by 10.1 miles per hour. Her average marks in bat speed, distance and exit velocity all increased, too.
“We knew she had the high capabilities for bat speed, for exit velocity, but for her to raise her numbers in average bat speed, average exit speed meant that she was doing it consistently,” Ricketts said.
The coach described Davidson as a “fearless” defender both able and willing to take hot shots at the hot corner. When the coach hits ground balls in practice, Davidson usually has a request: “Make it tough.”
It’s a mentality Davidson shares with others, according to Ricketts. In the weight room, she’s filled the role vacated by outfielder Candace Denis, telling teammates, “Let’s go, put some more weight on there; I’m going to outlift you.'”
“She’s not afraid to speak up to be a friend or to be someone to hold someone accountable,” Ricketts said.
Ricketts noted that Davidson is the veteran of the Bulldogs’ roster; the four players with as much or more experience in Starkville all entered the program as transfers. After a year sharing the left side of the infield with shortstop Madisyn Kennedy, Davidson has begun to impart valuable lessons to the younger player.
“It’s really fun to see them grow together and how her talk and her communication has helped Madi with hers as she’s learning to take over the infield,” Ricketts said.
Davidson’s influence will likely still be felt for a while longer. Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, she received an eligibility waiver to play one final season in 2022. If (perhaps when) she takes it, her final will come nearly nine years after she first pledged herself to the Bulldogs.
“She’s really been a joy to be around,” Ricketts said.
Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 36 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 36 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
