School Board praises Berwick's state track champ, runner-up baseball team

CENTERVILLE — At its first meeting since classes ended, the St. Mary Parish School Board devoted much of its Thursday meeting to championship level sports — specifically, Berwick High sports.

The board recognized Class 3A javelin champion Brett Bearb and the Berwick baseball team, which was the state runner-up in Class 3A.

And the board voted to name Berwick High’s baseball field for Lud Henry, whose connection with Panther baseball goes back more than 40 years.

Also Thursday, the board presented a plaque honoring member Sylvia Lockett, who died in October, to her sister and daughter.

Bearb and the baseball team lined up in front of the speaker’s lectern to receive their kudos from the board.

Bearb threw the javelin 167 feet to win the 3A state title.

The baseball Panthers tore through the Class 3A playoff field, never failing to score fewer than nine runs before the title game and downing Sterlington 9-4 in the semifinals in Sulphur.

In the championship game with Lutcher, Berwick had runners on second and third in the seventh before Lutcher eked out a 5-4 win for the Class 3A title.

“You made the town of Berwick proud,” board member Michael Taylor told the team. “We have a proud tradition of baseball in Berwick.”

Tradition also played a role in the renaming of the Berwick baseball field for Henry, who played on the first Panthers team in 1975.

Board President and former coach Kenny Alfred said he was with Morgan City High at the time, and remembered the “short, chubby kid” with the unusual name.

Henry went on to be-come a Berwick High coach who received state Coach of the Year honors and led the Panthers to district titles throughout the 1980s and early ’90s.

Henry was an assistant coach for the 2018 Class 3A championship team and was an assistant to his son Seth during this year’s state runner-up campaign.

“It really was a special year,” Henry said.

Alfred and Henry coached against each other over the years, but “when the time came, I asked him to be godfather to one of my children,” Alfred said.

Henry currently serves as a member of the Berwick Town Council.

Also Thursday:

—The board remembered Lockett with a Louisiana School Board Association memorial plaque.

Board member Pearl Rack presented plaques to Lockett’s daughter, Kaylynn Hurst, and Lockett’s sister, Arline Lockett Smith.

—Lt. Oscar West of the St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s Office, who serves as a security officer for the school system, told the board he was unable to attend the most recent conference at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette on school safety and security. The meetings develop best practices.

“These are things that keep us up at night,” West said.

But the good news, from a deputy who attended in West’s place, is that St. Mary Parish schools are already making the changes identified as best practices.

The school system has undertaken a series of changes to create a holding area into which visitors to parish schools are directed as they enter each school, rather than allowing them to move through hallways or other common areas.

Berwick and Patterson high schools are the last to undergo the modifications, which are expected to be complete this summer.

—The board voted to make the Morgan City Review its official journal.