Bluejackets resilient in win over Royals

TAYLOR MILL — Mason County ran into a resilient bunch on Saturday at the 10th Region baseball tournament at Scott High.

The Royals jumped out to a 6-2 lead, but the never say quit Nicholas County Bluejackets battled back to take the game 10-7.

It was a fourth inning, two-out rally that got the Bluejackets going from some simple words by their coach, Travis Sims.

“Who do we play next?” Sims asked the group.

The team and coaching staff responded, “Coach, we’re down 6-2.”

Sims said, “We got this.”

Four runs later the game was suddenly tied and the Bluejackets used the momentum from there to head to Monday’s semifinals.

For those unaware, Sims is battling cancer and is in dire condition, already outliving doctor’s predictions in his battle. But he still shows up to every game in a wheelchair to support his team.

“We’ve been resilient all year. We’re going to continue to be that way. Coach Sims never gave up on us and I think that was huge for the boys. The kids lived off that. It was big of him to do that and the kids rallied around that,” Bluejackets assistant Josh Earlywine said.

His team has fed off Sims’ resilience to a 24-6 record and now just two wins away from their ultimate goal, a regional championship.

The Bluejackets initial strategy nearly backfired, deciding to hold out their ace and 10th Region Player of the Year Dalton Davenport from starting on the mound and saving him for later in the tournament.

The Royals took advantage, tagging starter Brayson Ring for three singles from the first four batters to jump out to a 1-0 lead. Earlywine made a decision to turn to his No. 2 guy, Ryan Johnson from there.

But the Royals weren’t done yet, Carson Pugh with a two-out, two-run single to make it a 3-0 game quickly in the first.

The momentum swings in this game were that of a heavyweight fight.

Nicholas bounced back in the second with two runs, the Royals losing starting pitcher Jake Hardeman as he was ejected for arguing a play at the plate that made it 3-1.

“The ump said it was inappropriate language. Just left the umpire with no choice and just certain things you can’t say,” Royals coach Chad Mefford said. “Jake is a competitive kid and has had so much growth over the past few years with us. He had a special year for us out there and really stinks that it happened. He just wants to win so bad.”

In what was Mason County’s initial strategy to utilize their depth at pitching at any signs of trouble had to be sped up. They turned to freshman Eli Porter who got out of a jam in the second to keep the Royals ahead with a 3-2 lead.

Then Johnson got a little wild on the mound for Nicholas in the third, the Royals taking advantage of an error and three walks to add three more runs in the inning, Pugh adding another RBI with a single, Jamison Gifford scoring on a walk and Pugh later scoring on a passed ball.

The Royals looked prime to snap a six-game losing streak in the region tournament with a comfortable 6-2 cushion.

A walk and the third of five Royals errors on the day started to get things cooking for Nicholas in the fourth. Porter got two strikeouts to follow to get them two outs in the frame, but an error on a pickoff attempt allowed a run to score.

“We just didn’t play our defensive game. Some silly plays out there, trying to make some hero special plays and throwing the ball around a little bit and that’s what probably got us beat,” Mefford said. “One error kind of got things started for them, but battled our butts off, been doing it all year and feel so bad for the seniors.”

Jacob Hatton added an RBI single and the game was suddenly tied after a two-run single from Carter Wigglesworth.

The Royals bats started to go silent from there, Johnson getting in a groove over the next two innings, retiring six of the next eight batters, Asher Braughton’s double off the fence monster in left the only hit he allowed.

The Blujackets took a 7-6 lead in the fifth on a Tate Letcher double.

A costly top of the sixth in which the Royals committed a pair of errors added another run to score to make it 8-6 with a call to Davenport to the mound to close this one out.

The run in the top of the sixth proved to be vital, Braughton hitting a solo homer to right in the bottom of the sixth to make it a one-run game again at 8-7.

The Bluejackets added a couple of insurance runs in the seventh to get it to 10-7, Davenport closing the door from there in the bottom of the seventh.

They now advance to Monday’s semis to take on the Montgomery County-Campbell County winner in a game that will be played at 2 p.m. on Sunday.

For Mason County, it adds to a list of tough losses in the regional tournament dating back to 2016 in which they’ve either been tied or had the lead in four of five games late in innings during that stretch.

“Hopefully our days of being embarrassed in the regional tournament are over. Everybody knows that we’re fighters now, we’ve earned a lot of respect, got a winning record, won 10 out of 15 to end the season and that’s a big stepping stone for us,” Mefford said.

They do lose four valuable seniors, Hardeman, Braughton, Tyler Stice and Brayden Porter that they’ll have to replace.

“Great kids. We want them to know they’ve started something special and there’s no doubt in my mind we’re going in the right direction. We’re going to miss those four for sure, four leaders for us all year,” Mefford said.

Braughton was an All-Tournament team selection with a big day at the plate, going 3-for-4 with a home run, double, RBI, three runs scored and two stolen bases.

But the future is bright for the Royals, underclassmen Eli Porter, Landon Scilley, Pugh, Trey Cracraft and Westin Messer providing a glimpse of the future for what they were able to do this year paired with rising seniors Jamison Gifford and Hunter Thompson to give them a solid nucleus to start with for next season and beyond.

“We have some youngsters and those kids are going to be good. We earned some more respect today, I really believe that. We faced their No. 2 and then No. 1 today. We’ve been seeing that and that tells you where we’re headed. We battled, just made some mistakes in the field,” Mefford said.

BLUEJACKETS 10, ROYALS 7

NICHOLAS COUNTY — 020-411-2 — 10-10-2

MASON COUNTY — 303-001-0 — 7-8-5

2B — (NC) Ring 2, Letcher (MC) Braughton

HR — (MC) Braughton

RBI — (NC) Wigglesworth 3, Ring, Johnson, Letcher, Hatton (MC) Pugh 3, Braughton, B. Porter, Stice

R — (NC) Ring 2, Davenport 2, Morris 2, Letcher 2, Hatton 2 (MC) Braughton 3, Scilley, B. Porter, Gifford, Pugh

WP — Johnson. LP — Scilley.

Records: Nicholas County 24-6, Mason County 12-10