There is some added incentive to watch college athletics right here in America’s first two-college town during the 2018-19 season. Both Hampden-Sydney College (H-SC) and Longwood University will be welcoming into their programs student-athletes who made names for themselves in high school right here in Farmville.

I am excited to see Fuqua School standout Hunter Gilliam continue his baseball career as a Lancer. This will be the first time since 2015 that someone from The Herald’s coverage area played for the Longwood baseball team. The last player was Kyri Washington, who was from Prospect, though he attended Grafton High School in Yorktown.

Fuqua is also sending four new student-athletes to Hampden-Sydney.

Billy French, who was a star for the Falcons in both lacrosse and football, will represent the Tigers on the lacrosse field. Knowing that the successful 2018 H-SC squad had an enormous senior class — 18 players — gives me hope that French could see some good playing time as a freshman.

Jalen Patteson was a standout for Fuqua’s soccer team, and he will look to make a similar impact on Hampden-Sydney’s squad. It is a good time for Tigers soccer, as the program bounced back from a 7-10 season in 2015 and a 6-9-1 campaign in 2016 to go 10-7-1 last year.

Both Michael Davis and Kevin Dunn are joining the H-SC football team, which rebounded from a 3-7 run in 2016 to a 6-4 finish in 2017. Like Gilliam in baseball, Davis and Dunn join their college teams right after having helped their corresponding high school teams compete for state championships.

Though no longer a student-athlete, Daniel Wooten will add a local angle of interest to Longwood cross country. The former Prince Edward County High School track team runner is now officially head coach of the Longwood cross country program.

Titus Mohler is the sports editor for The Farmville Herald and Farmville Newsmedia, LLC. His email address is Titus.Mohler@FarmvilleHerald.com.