ROCKINGHAM – The Richmond Senior High School Raiders baseball team finished the 2017 season with a 15-12 overall record, and a 5-5 mark in the (then) Southeastern Conference. And head coach Ricky Young doesn’t want his returning players to forget it.
On a team that had nine seniors and 13 juniors, Young knows that between great competition and unfortunate injuries, the Raiders underachieved last year. But the returning squad this year looks promising.
“I think we’ve got a good group of leaders,” Young said of his heavy upperclassmen squad. “Those guys learned some things from last year. We had some untimely injuries, and we underachieved, but we learned some lessons last year.”
With baseball basically a year-round sport now, the head coach said his team had a great summer and was able to get in some great practices in the fall.
But after losing last season in the first round of the state playoffs, a first for Young since he arrived, he acknowledged that his team is better than that. With that belief as the foundation, the Raiders have been hitting the weights.
“We put a lot of emphasis in the weight room. We think that’s something that’s very productive,” said Young. “They’ve really bought into what we do. We’ve gotten stronger and our speed and agility has improved.”
With the bulk of their training and practices behind them, however, pitching will be the key to winning,according to Young. And he’s got the horses to do it. With a 1-2 punch of Jonathan Lee and Trey Watkins on the mound, Young feels like his team is going to have a chance at victory every time they step on the field.
With a mantra of great pitching, solid defense and an offense that will be able to scratch out enough runs to win the game, this could potentially be a year that sees the Raiders move from middle of the road in the SEC to top of the standings in the Sandhills Athletic Conference.Â
“Our goal every year is to win the conference. You have to put your goals in order,” Young explained. “Win the conference first, then the conference tournament. We’d like to compete for a state championship. We obviously want to compete for it, but there`s a lot of good 4A programs in North Carolina. In order to be there in the end, we don’t have to be the best team. We just have to be the best team every day that we can be.”
Young went on to say that in the playoffs the last few years, Richmond has run into some excellent pitchers, as well as injuries to some key players. But right now, with the team healthy, the pitching staff ready to go and All-Conference shortstop Drew Lovin back up the middle, Richmond was able to defeat South Meck High School 3-0, and West Stanley High School 4-2 this past Saturday.
Also of note, Young has 12 players at his disposal that can take the rubber on any given night. With over half his team being able to pitch, Young reiterated that he expects Richmond to have the mentality and confidence that they can win every single game this season.
The Raiders will kick off the new season at home at 5 p.m. on Thursday against Terry Sanford High School, followed by another home matchup Friday versus their rival across the river, Anson High School.
