We did it. The Elon White Sox are Burlington Pee Wee B-Bracket Champions. We peaked at the right time, playing unbelievably well this week, especially the last two games. We went 8-4 in the regular season to finish in 2nd place in our division then ran off three wins in the tournament to win it. Game 1 was a tight one. Game 2 we scored 11 in the first inning and they never got 3 outs on us - our at-bats were ended every inning due to the 10-run rule, and we won 25-13.

And the championship game was pure magic. We started Thursday night by losing the coin-toss for the 3rd straight game and being the away team (and home-field advantage is huge at this age because there can be so much scoring, especially in the later innings). But we jumped out with 7 runs in the top of the first. Our opponent was Harvest Baptist, and their first two batters scored before the game was stopped due to lightning, then eventually called for the night due to rain. We were scheduled to resume play at 6:30 Friday, but the weather didn’t look promising. After a quick hit of hard rain the rest of a big thunderstorm skirted south of us and we were able to start the game at around 7:00.

Harvest scored 6 more in the bottom of the 1st to take an 8-7 lead. We only scored 1 in the 2nd and they scored 5 more to extend the lead to 13-8. I was worried. But then we scored 15 in the top of the 3rd before having to switch sides with only 2 outs due to the 10 run rule because we had gone up 23-13. Our #3 hitter led off the inning with a double then we rolled off 15 straight singles. We didn’t crush the ball and end up with a lot of extra base hits, but we consistently hit the ball well and put the pressure on them to make plays, and that worked out well for us. They scored 6 in the bottom of the 3rd to pull within 4 at 23-19. We scored 5 in the top of 4th to go up 28-19, an inning where we showed our most power of the night with a lead-off triple and a 3-run homer that ended our scoring for the inning. Harvest scored 6 more in the bottom of the 4th to pull within 3 at 28-25.

We broke the game open in the 5th by scoring 11 in the top of the inning to go up 39-25 and holding them to only a single run in the bottom of the inning. We scored another run in the top of the 6th and left the bases loaded (with a 10 run lead we were only allowed 5 batters in the inning), so we headed to the bottom of the last inning needing 3 outs to win the championship and carrying a 40-26 lead.

One of the things I’m most proud of in our games is when we make defensive outs. So many times the kids this age strike out, so defensive innings often end without the defense ever having gotten a batter out in the field. And Harvest didn’t strike out much in this game and not at all in the 6th. We had to earn our last three outs, and the kids did a great job doing exactly that. The first few batters got hits, including a lead-off triple and next-batter double that got their crowd fired up for a comeback - and a 14-run comeback in the last inning is not at all unprecedented at this age level. Their 4th batter grounded out, I believe to our pitcher, who made a great throw to first base for the out. The next batter got a hit but was tagged out at 2nd on a heads-up play by our shortstop. One out to go, but they had the top of their lineup up. Their leadoff hitter was a stud and roped a line-drive to left, but our leftfielder fielded it on a hop and got it back to the infield quickly to hold him to a single. Their #2 hitter singled to give them runners at the corners. And the next batter hit a sharp grounder to our second baseman, who’s been an outfielder all year and just started playing the infield this week because we’re missing a few players who are on vacation this week. He fielded it cleanly and stepped on 2nd for the force. Game over. What a great feeling, and to end on a play like that that’s such a great example of how much the kids have improved this year.

I’m so proud of those kids. What a great group.