This year’s Little League all-star competition did not go as well as West Windsor’s teams had hoped, but Cranbury-Plainsboro’s 12-year-old baseball team made it to the Final Eight in the District 12 tournament.
C-P finished 2-1 in pool play, defeating Bordentown, 3-0, and then falling to Sunnybrae, 18-8. In the third game, C-P defeated North Trenton to land a spot in the Final Eight.
For the West Windsor 12-year-old baseball team, the season started out on a positive note when it defeated Chambersburg in the opening round. The team then lost a close game as Robbinsville came from behind to win, 7-3.
Then, “we lost (4-3) in extra innings to a walk-off home run to Princeton, which knocked us out of the Final Eight,” said West Windsor manager Ted Phelan. “We were winning in that game, and they came back and scored to tie it up in the regulation play.”
In the game, Josh Miller had only given up one hit. Then in the eighth inning, after West Windsor had caught up, the team’s progress was erased by the walk-off home run.
But West Windsor gave Princeton and Robbinsville a run for their money. The teams “are two of the top teams in the district,” said Phelan. “We lost to two really good teams, but in both cases, the game could have really gone either way.”
West Windsor struggled against Princeton and stranded 11 runners on base. “We had big opportunities to put the game away early, and we didn’t take advantage of that,” said Phelan. “In the first and third innings, we left the bases loaded both times and failed to get a runner home.”
He said his team could have advanced if it had been able to hit just a little more. But Phelan says baseball is not over for his West Windsor team this summer. “We’re looking into some other local tournaments to pick up as well,” he said.
“Last year was a year full of West Windsor success; it’s a tough standard to uphold,” said Phelan. “Sometimes it’s the luck of the draw with pool play with getting stonger teams in our pool, whereas some of the other teams who are not as strong will be moving on just because of the pools they were in.”
Still, “you have to beat the good teams anyway,” Phelan added. “You always like to play more games and have your season extended longer, but you still have to beat the good teams.”
