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Salem High's Nicole Gubellini notched eight strikeouts, but primarily pitched to contact.

The problem for Concord High hitters taking their cuts? Gubellini never allowed them to get the barrel of the bat on the ball.

The end result, aided greatly by strong infield defense, was a no-hitter for the senior hurler and 5-0 Division I softball win April 11. Two days earlier, she threw an abbreviated no-no in Salem's season-opening 14-0 mercy-rule win at Rochester's Spaulding High.

Concord's Lindsey Stevenson reached on an infield error to open the game. Then, Gubellini retired 21 outs in a row. Her complete-game masterpiece took 65 minutes to complete.

“I can feel it, when things are good,” said Gubellini, a four-year pitcher for the Blue Devils and scholarship recruit of Quinnipiac University. “Some days, some pitches are better than others.”

Gubellini claimed her changeup – among an array of pitches she throws with accuracy and confidence – wasn't consistently sharp against the Crimson Tide.

She could have fooled Concord coach Duke Sawyer. She did fool her share of hitters.

“She's tough. Salem's tough,” said Sawyer, who took last year's Tide team to the state final. “She pitched against us last year a little bit. She did well last year, too.”

In addition to fanning eight, Salem's ace induced 12 outs via grounders or weak infield pop-ups.

Everyone in the infield – from catcher Amanda Biron, third baseman Hannah Latham, shortstop Samantha Cloutier, second baseman Sarah Frahm and first baseman Emily O'Brien to Gubellini herself – played a part in recording at least one of those 12 outs.

Only one fly ball reached the outfield. Center fielder Stephanie Long tracked it down.

Strong pitching is nothing new at Salem, where Granite State legend Harold Sachs has led the Blue Devils to 14 state titles.

But last year's quarterfinal-round exit was a stunner. The Blue Devils, as the top tournament seed, were beaten by Nashua's Bishop Guertin High.

“We won the regular-season league last year. We believed we were the best team last year. That has not changed in our thinking,” said Sachs, who won his 500th career game last May. “And we just think we're better this year. I don't know what that's going to mean down the road.”

Should Gubellini give Salem a season worth of strong starts, it might mean trouble for the opposition.

MORE DIAMOND DOMINANCE
NHIAA baseball's April 9 Opening Day included a pair of mercy-rule-shortened no-hitters.

Jordan Bean tossed one for Division II St. Thomas Aquinas High of Dover. Nick Massa celebrated the other for Division II Kennett High of Conway.

STA beat Division I Dover High, 10-0, in five innings. Bean, a senior, tallied seven strikeouts and set down 14 batters to close the contest after issuing a one-out walk in the opening frame.

He also had the game-winning hit: a first-inning solo home run.

Kennett defeated Division III Berlin High, 10-0, in five innings. Massa, also a junior, fanned seven, walked one and contributed a run-scoring hit.

STILL GOING STRONG
Portsmouth High began taking aim at its fifth consecutive Division II baseball championship April 9. Coach Tim Hopley & Co. opened with an 11-1 win at Wolfeboro's Kingswood Regional.

The six-inning, 10-run mercy decision marked the 84th consecutive win for the Clippers.

Briefly the national record-holder late last spring, Portsmouth opened the 2012 campaign with an active win streak that ranked second to Martensdale-St. Mary's High (87) of Martensdale, Iowa.

Billy Hartmann ripped three hits, the biggest being an RBI double in the fifth. Hartmann's key hit snapped a 1-1 tie and sparked a seven-run outburst.

Rick Holt, the team's pitching ace this season, helped his cause with a two-run double. Dillon Crosby connected for a three-run, sixth-inning homer that capped the onslaught.

"I was pleased with the way we handled ourselves in the first week," said Hopley, whose club won its 85th straight game, a 12-1 decision at Northwood's Coe-Brown Academy, on April 13. "Our pitching was good, offensively we were okay. But we've got to do a better job on the defensive side of the ball. Our timing and judgment were off, and we'll have to pay more attention to that in the immediate future so that it doesn't become a problem."

'MID-SEASON FORM'
Since boys' lacrosse was first sanctioned by the NHIAA in 1994, only two programs in New Hampshire have celebrated a championship three-peat.

Bishop Guertin this spring aims to join Division I rival Pinkerton Academy of Derry (1994-97, 1999-2002) and Division II Bow High (2002-04, 2008-10) in accomplishing the feat.

Guertin's Cardinals, heavy preseason favorites to win a fifth overall title, started strong in their Division I opener April 10. The state's No. 1-ranked team in the New Hampshire GameDay top 10 (“X-factors: April 9-15, 2012”) overpowered No. 3 Hanover High, 15-3.

“They're, like, in mid-season form. We're still in preseason, I think,” quipped Hanover coach Jeff Reed, whose Marauders, Division I champs in 2007 and 2009 have teamed with the Cards to win all five titles from 2007-11.

Midfielder Paul Spinney powered BG's offense with a game-high four points (three goals, assist). His assist, on a dish to Hunter Allen late in the opening period, snapped a 1-1 deadlock.

It also set off a six-goal run to close the first half. Guertin's defense, when challenged, answered the call.

Close defenders Bob Fahey and Kyle Karaska, and long-stick midfielder Brody Smith, led the lock-down effort on Hanover's top threats. Attackman Christian Johansen and midfielder Christian Wolter didn't post a point.

“Our challenge to these guys is to come every day to practice, practice hard, get better by the time we leave the field,” BG coach Chris Cameron said. “And show up for every game.”

Marc Thaler is a reporter for the New Hampshire Union Leader & Sunday News. He co-hosts the “N.H. Sports Show” on Manchester's WGIR-AM 610 and the Seacoast's 96.7 FM every Saturday from 7-9 a.m. Read his “New Hampshire GameDay” blog and follow him on Twitter: @marc_thaler.

When it seemed clear that the Portsmouth (N.H.) High baseball team was about to extend the program’s winning streak to 83 games by beating St. Thomas Aquinas in last Saturday’s Division II championship game, the conversation in the Northeast Delta Dental press box turned to next season. How good will Portsmouth be in 20102?

The answer: pretty darn good.

Like most teams, the Clippers will have some significant pieces to replace, but Portsmouth will return most of its starting lineup. The key losses will be starting pitcher Keegan Taylor and center fielder Aidan O’Leary, both of whom have committed to play Division I baseball. Taylor will play for Northeastern, and O’Leary for Manhattan.

“We’ll have a decent nucleus of five or six guys coming back,” Portsmouth coach Tim Hopley said. “When you lose kids like [Taylor] and Aidan O’Leary it’s significant.”

Taylor, who earned the win in Portsmouth’s 9-6 triumph over St. Thomas (Dover), was 10-0 this season and 25-0 during his high school career. O’Leary hit .434 with a team-high 13 stolen bases this season.

Right fielder Quinn McCann, who entered the championship game with a .424 batting average, will also be tough to replace.

Portsmouth will return the following starters: catcher Conor Trefethen, third baseman Matt Feeney, shortstop Billy Hartmann, second baseman Connor McCauley, first baseman Ricky Holt and outfielder Kyle DiCesare.

McCauley, who can also catch, was batting a team-high .439 entering the championship game. Holt will replace Taylor as the team’s ace. He was 7-0 with a 1.56 ERA after he pitched a complete game against Laconia in the Division II semifinals. He pitched two scoreless innings in the championship game.

“Standing here right now I can’t see how we’re not going to drop off a bit, but I probably said that last year and the year before too,” Hopley said.

Portsmouth’s victory over St. Thomas handed the program its fourth-consecutive Division II championship. Portsmouth hasn’t lost a game since the 2007 season.

The Clippers broke the national record for consecutive victories when they beat Pembroke Academy to push the winning streak to 76 games during the regular season.

Although some people would like to see the Clippers move up to Division I, Hopley scoffed at the suggestion.

“People ask us about that all the time,” Hopley said. “My answer is simply, ‘If we were the biggest school in Division II then I would understand it, but we’re the fourth or fifth biggest school in Division II.

“The reality is if people expect us to move up based on success then 1) they haven’t paid attention to the program for the entirety, and 2) I would expect that they voice those concerns about the other four schools that have a bigger enrollment than we do.”

The Portsmouth junior varsity team lost five games this season, after suffering one loss from 2007 to 2010.

Portsmouth’s latest victory was one of its strangest. Because of a lightning delay, the game didn’t start until 10:25 p.m., and ended just before 1 a.m.

New Hampshire’s pitching rules also forced Hopley to get creative with how he used Taylor. Pitchers are allowed to throw a maximum of 16 innings in the tournament and Taylor had five innings of eligibility left entering the championship game. Taylor started the game on the mound, but also pitched four innings of relief.

Taylor moved from the mound to right field after the first inning. He moved back to the mound in the fourth, after Holt pitched two scoreless innings.

“It was something new,” Taylor said. “I’ve never sat that long. It must have been like 45 minutes that I was sitting out for. It was tough. I got a little cold.

“We were up in the air until five minutes before game time. I went to [Hopley] and said, ‘OK, I can do that.’ It was in my hands whether I wanted to do it or not.”

Hopley said until the start of the game was delayed by lightning he planned to start Holt, and bring Taylor in at the beginning of the third.

“I was concerned with them getting momentum early,” Hopley said. “Ricky being a sophomore in an unfamiliar setting – and certainly one that’s full of pressure – I thought it might be best to go with Keegan because he’s been on that stage before and he’s very familiar with the hitters he was going to be facing.

“I put [Taylor] in a tough spot. We went back and forth all week long on how we were going to handle the whole pitching thing.”

Taylor allowed six runs on six hits, struck out 11 and walked one. He struggled through the fifth, when St. Thomas (12-8) scored five runs on four hits to take a 6-5 lead.

Although Taylor put his team in a hole in the fifth, he pulled the Clippers out of it in the sixth. That’s when he broke a 6-6 tie by hitting a two-out, two-strike pitch just inside the right-field line for a three-run triple that capped the scoring.

The Clippers (20-0) tied the game when Conor Trefethen started the inning with a double and ended up on third because of a throwing error. Kyle DiCesare followed with an RBI double that erased Portsmouth’s 6-5 deficit.

Hopley called the victory over St. Thomas the program’s biggest win in his 16 years as the program’s head coach.

“What the program has accomplished [setting the national record for consecutive victories} and what we’ve gone through and the attention that it has earned, to get to this point and not finish it with a win  that wasn’t something that I was prepared to deal with,” Hopley said. “It was a real important game for us. This was special.”

The focus these past two weeks has been on win streaks.

New Hampshire is home to two teams, each with a consecutive victory count that's quite high – and continues to climb.

On the Seacoast, Portsmouth High's baseball team owns a state-record 68-game win streak, a run that's seven wins shy of matching the national record (75), according to the National Federation of State High School Associations. Michigan's Homer High set the standard in 2005.

Meanwhile, in the southern part of the state, the Londonderry High girls' lacrosse squad rides a state-best 42-gamer.

“[The win streak is] something that's talked about throughout the community. We see more people coming to games as we get closer,” said senior Keegan Taylor, Portsmouth's Northeastern-bound pitcher. “As a team, we try not to think about it as much. It's not a distraction, but it is added pressure.

“Game-to-game is what we focus on most,” he added. “You don't want to be that team that loses.”

You'll hear the same sentiment echoed in Londonderry's camp. Here are three additional similarities that link Portsmouth and Londonderry, and their win streaks:

Tremendous turnarounds – Portsmouth coach Tim Hopley and Londonderry mentor Bob Slater didn't inherit powerhouse programs. They built them.

Hopley's start 16 seasons ago was particularly inauspicious.

“We were on a 30-game losing streak midway through my first season. I started 0-10 in my coaching career and the team lost the previous 20 prior to that. I thought I was going to get fired. So, all this stuff we're in the middle of, I don't see it as a negative,” Hopley said when asked if the constant questions about Portsmouth's win streak have grown tiresome.

Slater, in his sixth year guiding the girls, didn't take over a team trying to snap a long losing streak. But, he has often said, a defeatist's mentality hovered over the program.

Londonderry went 5-11 the year before Slater arrived. Six of those setbacks were at least eight-goal margins of defeat. Confidence among athletes was non-existent. The Lancers won 11 games in Slater's first season (2006).

“When I took the girls' program over, being in the concrete business, I said 'We’re going to put the foundation in this year,” Slater said. “Then, we’re going to build the house the next year, and we’re going to fill it.

“Lo and behold, we won two championships my fourth and fifth years,” he added. “It’s a game plan.”

Succession of stars – Graduation every spring is the great equalizer. Once-dominant teams can quickly disappear as rosters turn over.

The Clippers and Lancers lost their share of stars. As their streaks suggest, though, the talent pools are plenty deep.

Quality pitching has been a consistent theme at Portsmouth for three-plus seasons.

Southpaw Tim Welch (Bowdoin) and righty Ben Hart (UMass) pitched the program to the 2008 title, the first in the run.

Welch, at the time, was featured in Sports Illustrated “Faces in the Crowd” for not allowing a run all season (52 innings pitched, 9-0 record). Hart was also 9-0.
Pitcher Nate Jones (Wake Forest) and slugger Mike Montville (Maryland), who helped clinch crowns in 2009 and 2010, are also among the former stars responsible for three straight perfect campaigns.

This year, Taylor and Manhattan recruit Aidan O'Leary, a center fielder and designated hitter, are the leaders as three-year varsity players. The team ace, Taylor dominated his first two starts, totaling 26 strikeouts while scattering four hits.

Sophomore Ricky Holt, Portsmouth's No. 2 pitcher, should soon find himself atop the rotation.

Just like Portsmouth's streak, Londonderry's run has survived because new leaders continue to emerge.

Kayla Green – whose career totals include 261 goals and 172 assists for 433 points – paced LHS to its first Final Four in 2008. Now a Stonehill standout, she led the Lancers to their first title in 2009.

Virginia's Dana Boyle (257-79–336), arguably the best all-around talent to hail from the Granite State, and Vermont's Marcie Marino headlined last year's super-stacked squad.

This season, junior-laden Londonderry remains a juggernaut. Midfielder Jenny Thompson and attacker Leah Walter, both juniors, lead the high-powered Lancers. Freshman midfielder Alexa Bedell, already a force, is Londonderry's latest rising star.

Tunnel vision – Players may discuss their squad's streak periodically. But it almost never comes up in conversation with the coaches.

That doesn't mean each mentor finds his team's feat insignificant. Hopley and Slater simply place far more importance on the team's need to be better the next time out. It's the reason, after all, that these streaks exist.

“The thing I want to make sure we're still doing is continuing to improve, so when push comes to shove (in the state tournament), we know how to handle it,” Hopley said.

Likewise, Slater devotes complete attention to preparing for every opponent, regardless of record. He demands nothing less from the Lancers.

Of course, these teams and their streaks possess unique qualities. These two top the list:

Clipper quintet knows national pressure – Five Clippers played for Portsmouth's 11- and 12-year-old all-star team that reached the United States semifinals of the 60th Little League World Series in 2006.

The quintet includes Taylor and the junior foursome of third baseman Matt Feeney, catcher Connor Trefethen, shortstop Billy Hartman and right fielder/back-up backstop Connor McCauley.

“We played on a big stage, in front of cameras,” said Taylor, the starter in the LLWS national semifinal. “Being in the game, you're not personally thinking about pressure. But having that (experience) under your belt ... does make it easier to (compete) in big situations.”

Lancers have a long way to go – Londonderry, unlike Portsmouth, is still several perfect seasons from challenging its sport's record for longest win streak. If the streak survives the week – which ends with games against sub-.500 Salem High on Friday and the Bay State's Duxbury High on Saturday – Londonderry will own a 44-gamer (Framingham High was the last team to top the Lancers).

That's 60 wins shy of Loch Raven High. The Baltimore-based program is said to own the record with 104 straight wins from 1973-82.

“We are definitely aware of (the streak). We are all so proud of it,” said Thompson, a known name to several Division I women's college lacrosse coaches. “We all think about it all the time.

“Everyone wants to beat us,” she added. “We are everyone’s target.”

Marc Thaler is a staff writer for the New Hampshire Union Leader & Sunday News. He can be reached at marc.thaler@gmail.com. You can read his blog, "New Hampshire GameDay" and follow him on Twitter @marc_thaler.