Of course the ball found Kate Shuboy.

With two outs in the seventh inning, Paw Paw Red Wolf Kourtney Nichols stung a line drive to Shuboy on the mound. She knocked it down and threw to first baseman Anna McKiernan, who squeezed the final out of the No. 7 Richmond Blue Devils’ 2025 Division 2 softball state championship win, a 3-0 shutout of Paw Paw.

“It’s funny,” Shuboy said. “Like it came back and I bobbled it, but then I knew we could get it out. And it just feels so unreal.”

As has been the case all postseason, the Ferris State commit was dominant across the board. She allowed the Red Wolves just one hit and one walk while striking out 10, and in the box, she went 2-for-2 with two doubles and a walk, collecting more hits than she allowed.

“I’ve had some pretty good pitchers that also won state titles in 2016 and 2021,” said Richmond head coach Howard Stuart, now a 3-time state champion in his 47 years with the team.

“She’s like them. All of them have a lot of speed and a lot of movement. And all of them are great hitters and all are great leaders.”

Shuboy sat the Red Wolves down in order with two punchouts in the top of the first inning, setting the stage for Kendall Nader’s leadoff slap triple over the left fielder’s head.

Two pitches later, Richmond had the lead when Kendall’s sister, Audrina, laid down a well-placed bunt to score her.

Kendall Nader was not on the team to start the season — the freshman was junior varsity up until their season ended the week of Memorial Day. Stuart saw her slapping and baserunning talents, and up she came.

“She’s just rock solid,” Stuart said. “Confidence. She believes she’s going to succeed. She was told to slap, ‘I’m going to slap over their heads.’ That’s called hitting, but yeah, that’s okay.”

From being a freshman on JV to scoring the go-ahead run as the leadoff hitter in the state championship game, Kendall Nader has taken the challenge head-on.

“It’s (exciting),” she said. “I was really happy when I got pulled up. I knew it was going to be fun.”

She and Shuboy had two hits, and so did McKiernan, who scored the Blue Devils’ final run of the season in the bottom of the sixth to give Shuboy some extra — if unneeded — insurance on a hit from Emma Bambrick.

Kendall Nader was just one of the pieces that Stuart had to find a place for as the Blue Devils’ season trudged along.

After they lost three-straight games to county rivals Anchor Bay and Dakota in late April, Stuart knew that the right combination was there, but it wasn’t until recently when they finally found it — and find it they did.

“I constantly play people every other game with a few exceptions,” Stuart said. “For the most part, every other game, I play people all season long to try to get them ready, because you don’t know who’s going to be able to do the job by the end.

“I changed the lineup. I’ve been doing it for years, and it works. It just works.”

Richmond’s departing seniors — Shuboy, Emmi Hildreth, Katherin Chrostowski, Lilly Peitz, Ashley Stafford and Kate Teltow — finish their careers with three district titles, three regional titles and, now, a state championship.“It feels unreal,” Shuboy said. “We knew we could do it, but it hasn’t really hit me yet that that was my last game. And it feels great to end off on a big win.”

The Blue Devils were forced to face a murderer’s row of quality Division 2 programs to get to this point. They started with district wins over private programs Notre Dame Prep (22-9) and Lutheran North (20-6). Then, in the regionals, they beat Orchard Lake St. Mary’s (16-14) on a game-winning two-run home run in the eighth inning, then followed it up by beating MAC White staple Marysville (21-8).

They beat Goodrich (26-9) in the state quarterfinals then No. 1 Escanaba (38-5) in the semis before beating Paw Paw (37-4) on Saturday.

That’s an average of 25.7 wins per team the Blue Devils, who finished 32-7, beat.

In the last three games of the season, Shuboy allowed four hits and zero runs against the elite of the elite.

“It makes it (the run) better because we’re from a small community, so not that many people know about us,” Shuboy said. “So it feels great to get our name out there and to beat these bigger schools.”

Kendall Nader praised her pitcher.

“She is just so humble, and it’s just great,” she said. “I trust her so much on the mound.”

It’s the third state title in Richmond’s 47-year history, all under Stuart, and second in Division 2 with the other being in 2021.