SELMA — Chelsea Sturdivant had been driving back and forth between Selma and Tuscaloosa to play softball.

Those days are over, and she has her seventh city championship to show for it.

Sturdivant, a softball player and nursing student at Stillman College, was a part of the Taylorville team that won the city recreation championship, 15-14, over First Avenue. She drove in three runs in the final inning to help Taylorville overcome a 14-9 deficit.

“Playing in the summer gives me more practice and experience,” Sturdivant said. “In the seventh grade, I played for Selma (High School). Both of those helped me get the scholarship at Stillman.”

Sturdivant played in the Selma recreation league from the time she was 6 years old until a couple of weeks ago, mostly under the coaching of her mother, Nadine Sturdivant, an assistant coach for the Saints.

“She’s a hard worker and she likes practice,” Nadine Sturdivant said. “Those take you a long way.”

When she got to Stillman, Chelsea Sturdivant was expecting to play second base. Due to injuries, she wound up behind home plate, catching for the first time in her life.

“It was real hard at first, but I got used to it,” Chelsea Sturdivant said. “I hope I can go back to second base, but if they need me to catch, that’s what I’ll do.”

While she won’t be playing anymore, Chelsea Sturdivant said she will still watch games in Selma. But she said it won’t be the same.

“I’m going to be bored just watching,” Chelsea Sturdivant said.

Her mother, however, will have other things to occupy her time. In addition to helping coach the Saints, Nadine Sturdivant said her daughter moving out of the recreation league offers her an opportunity to start all over coaching her grandson, who is about to start playing T-ball.