The List Gets Longer...

Washington D.C.

Capitol City Little League won its first District of Columbia championship since 2010 with a 7-1 victory over rival Northwest Washington. NWLL had won two straight titles and three of the last four since Cap City’s run of 20 straight city titles. Sofia Ohanian broke the game open in the third with a two-out two-run blast to Cap City up for good. Isaac Frumkin had a pair of doubles and an RBI. Robert Reynolds picked up the win giving up just three hits over 4 2/3 innings. He struck out five. Cap City will look to advance to the regional semifinals for the first time since 2004.


Alaska

Sitka knocked off defending state champion Gastineau Channel 5-1 in the District 2 finals behind a masterful pitching performance from Bryan Joseph who struck out nine batters and induced eight ground ball outs in 5 2/3 innings. Sitka will now face Abbott-O-Rabbit LL from Anchorage in the Best-of-5 state championship series.
Florida

The state tournament is set in Florida as all eight sections are complete. The best teams nearly always advance through sections in Florida because of their great schedule. They play round robin with no championship game. If you’re unbeaten and you beat everyone else already, why should you have to beat them again in a single game, right? Right.

Plant City looks like a solid contender and is the defending state champion. Florida tends to be wide-open in the state finals, however.

Virginia

Virginia is down to its final four now with Tuckahoe American, Fairfax National, West Springfield American, and defending state champion Great Falls. Tuckahoe hasn’t allowed a run in four games now after mercy-ruling Lynchburg in the quarterfinals. Although, West Springfield has been a state champion with this group before.

Texas

Universal Little League of Corpus Christi needed to sweep a double header this morning against powerhouse Midland Northern and they did. Juan Sosa and Jacob Garza each hit home runs in an 11-1 rout during the first game. Garza struck out 14 batters in the second game to pull off the sweep with a 3-0 victory. It was the fourth straight elimination victory in three days.

Hawaii

Central East Maui sits in the driver’s seat for the Hawaii state championship after knocking off Waipio 3-1 in the winners’ bracket final over the weekend despite being outhit 4-3 in the game. Waipio led 1-0 before Rayven Ruiz tied it with a solo home run.

Mississippi

Ocean Springs Little League won its sixth state title in the last 10 years. OSLL is 8-0 in the tournament so far and won the best 2-out-of-3 series with Hattiesburg with a pair of mercy-rule victories. Mitch Murrell hit two home runs in the state title series to lead Ocean Springs. Mississippi is looking for its first trip to Williamsport since Hattiesburg went in 1977.

Northern California

Santa Cruz American jumped out to an 8-0 lead after two innings and held onto a 10-5 win. Javier Lopez blasted a pair of home runs in the victory. SCA will face Belmont Redwood Shores on Wednesday.

Nebraska

Kearney Little League is looking to defending its regional crown and got off to a great start by winning the Nebraska state championship. It’s the third straight trip to Indianapolis for the Midwest Region Tournament for Kearney. Keegan Thurston was dominant on the mound for KLL while striking out 12 in the 3-0 victory over Omaha Keystone. 

State Champions List

Utah- Dixie LL (St. George)
Alabama- Jackson LL

Oklahoma- Tulsa LL
Idaho- Coeur d’Alene LL
Washington- Eastlake LL (Sammamish)
Mississippi- Ocean Springs LL
Nebraska- Kearney LL
Washington, D.C.- Capitol City LL
Texas West- Universal LL (Corpus Christi)
Louisiana- Bossier National LL

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Monday's Little League Roundup (July 15, 2013)

We hit some of the Northwest, New England, Midwest, and Europe today on our road trip around the Little League world. I personally went out to my home section's winners' bracket final today in New York Section 4. Pearl River Little League continued to dominate its opponents after a bit of a slow start against Fishkill. Sean Flaherty proved to me once again that he's an elite hitter in this age group with his fifth home run in four games and a HUGE three-run hit. He's for real. I'm not sure Pearl River has the pitching to bring home a state championship this year, but they certainly hit up and down the order. They bunt the heck out of the ball too. Away we go.........

New Hampshire

The state finals are set in New Hampshire. Salem won a tough District 1 with a walk-off home run from John Olivo to pull out a 9-7 victory in the “if” game. Bedford forced the “if” game over the weekend with a 19-1 thrashing of Salem.

Salem will face Rye LL from District 2 in the best-of-three state finals. Rye romped through its district unbeaten and won the state championship as 10-year olds two years ago. Expect to see a lot of long balls.

Germany

KMC Little League of Rammstein AFB is looking to get back to Williamsport in the newly created Europe & Africa region. KMC is 3-0 so far with a couple of thrashings in its last two games. The American boys from Germany have a lot of pop in their bats.

Nebraska

Kearney went all the way to the Little League World Series last year and now they’ve caught the bug. Kearney waltzed into the state tournament with big victories over its district foes. Kearney returns at least two players with LLWS experience as well as a coach. That’s important when/if they reach the regionals again.

Rhode Island

The Rhode Island state tournament is always one of the toughest in the country. All four districts are strong and they love their baseball. Perennial-power Lincoln is back in the state tourney after a few years and they dominated too. Johnston should come out of District 1 and they look very strong. Coventry upended the 11-year old state champions in their district.

Washington

Washington is into its winners bracket semifinals right now and quite frankly, I don’t know the teams that are there. None of them have a long term pedigree in the state. There’s no Kents, Redmond’s, Richland’s, etc… It’ll be interesting. West Seattle had the biggest blowout victory, but also had a bye.

Oregon

I don’t have any news out of Oregon yet, but I had to go on one of my scheduling rants. I’ve always hated single elimination at every level. It’s atrocious, especially after pool play. Well, Oregon decided to find out who the best team in the state is this year with a single elimination tournament of nine teams. They all play like 3-4 pool play seeding games that mean nothing, then play single elimination from there on out. It is completely mind-boggling to me.

Vermont
South Burlington continued its quest towards a repeat trip to Bristol CT for the New England regional. The boys from Burlington routed everyone in their district including a 14-1 victory in the final. They have approximately 5-6 players back from last year’s run in the regional.

Delaware

The big news in Delaware today is that Newark National is looking great again. National has won back-to-back state championships and then went 7-1 in pool play at the Mid-Atlantic regional in those years. A 1-0 loss to Par-Troy East NJ kept them from Williamsport last year. Canal from Wilmington was supposed to be the state favorite, but Newark put a hurting on them tonight with a 10-2 victory behind Nate Hardcastle, the lone returner from last year’s 12-year old team. Watch out for the Nats.

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Nebraska: Kearney Little League

Nebraska: Kearney Little League

Thirty-Year History: 2011, 2010, 2008, 2000.

Number of Majors Team: Eight

Roster: N/A

Preview: Kearney has become the power program in the state of Nebraska in recent years winning four of the last five state championships now after a 15-0 thrashing of Blair in the Nebraska state championship. According to Nebraska Central News, Blake Quintana and Jared Wegner each homered for Kearney in the title game. Wegner tossed a complete-game four-inning shutout. Kearney made it all the way to the Midwest Regional championship game a season ago dropping a 4-2 decision to Harney (Rapid City), South Dakota. While the College World Series is fully supported in Nebraska each year in Omaha, no team from the Cornhusker State has ever reached Williamsport for the Little League World Series.