Roane County softball eyes new win streak

Roane County’s Mahailey Nicholson recorded her 800th career strikeout during her five-inning no-hitter on Monday in Elizabeth.
(Photo by Jay W. Bennett)

ELIZABETH — All good things must come to an end and that was the case for Roane County’s softball program on Tuesday at Herbert Hoover.

The Raiders of head coach Sam Salvucci, who earned career victory No. 400 last Thursday in Spencer, received a no-hitter on Monday evening against Wirt County from senior Mahailey Nicholson, which extended the Raiders’ school record winning streak to 18 games.

“We have five games that we lost because of the rain,” said Salvucci after the win against the Tigers. “We were supposed to go to Fairmont on an overnight trip to play East Fairmont, Fairmont Senior and North Marion, and it all got wiped out. We got two games with Nicholas County wiped off the slate. Tug Valley, we didn’t get to play them.”

Roane County will enter Friday’s Little Kanawha Conference semifinals at Sue Morris Sports Complex at 18-1 after falling 8-0 in six innings to the Huskies, who were aided by five Raider errors as Laila Varney had 16 strikeouts in her no-hitter.

“Well, we got to get our bats going better,” Salvucci stressed when asked what his team had to focus on the rest of the way.

“We got to start hitting better. Our pitching that we’re going to see will improve dramatically starting tomorrow, but we just got to get going.”

The head coach said of reaching 400 wins against Braxton County “it was senior night, pretty cool,” and added of Nicholson “she provides good leadership and she’s got everybody else always on top of their game.

“We have people who are limited in what they can do, but everybody is backing everybody else up. Good chemistry.”

Nicholson, who owned the school record for strikeouts following her junior season, reached career punchout No. 800 against Wirt County.

“I’m definitely looking forward to these big moments because this is what this whole regular season has worked up to,” Nicholson said after Monday’s win knowing the Raiders were heading to play last year’s Class AA state runner-up.

“I mean being 18-0 that’s a big deal, but really your record doesn’t matter. Whenever you come into LKCs and sectionals, that’s what matters, the championships.”

The right-hander was more than amped with how senior night turned out.

“It was pretty amazing,” Nicholson said. “Nobody had any idea that it was coach Sal’s 400th win.

“It was a big secret and his son came in from Pittsburgh. It was pretty special and I was glad to be a part of that.”

The Raider is also thankful to be back in the LKC Night of Champions for a fourth straight season.

“I was there my freshman year and broke my finger,” recalled Nicholson, who added of her final campaign “being a senior and having a young team and being the pitcher and going 18-0, I’ve really had to push my younger girls into actually like talking and getting up in the dugout and everything and bringing energy, and it’s finally starting to piece together.

“At the beginning of the season it was a little quiet, but I think we’re all starting to connect now and that’s great because this is when it matters.”

This year’s Roane County team set the benchmark with the 18-game winning streak, which surpassed the old record of 12 during the Casey Lassiter era.

“That’s probably been my highlight because at the beginning of the season I didn’t come into this thinking I want to be 18-0, like I didn’t think I wanted to win this many games and like have a streak,” she said.

“It was just going out there and playing every game with all you got. It was thinking one game at a time and I think that’s how we got to 18-0, is not by looking at the big picture ahead, but just taking it one game at a time.”

Roane County is set to face defending LKC champion Wahama in one 5 p.m. LKC semifinal. St. Marys and Doddridge County collide in the other.

Contact Jay Bennett at jbennett@newsandsentinel.com