Photoessay #67 - Gold Qualifiers!

The team we work with qualified for the last berth in the Gold Nationals in a grueling tournament this past weekend. It's wonderful to post a victorious team who has played hard to get their reward (a self-financed trip to Oklahoma City in August?) however there was another team that they defeated in an extremely close game which ended with the tying runner being hit with a batted ball to end the game. That's a pretty tough way to win...and lose!

As one parent said "The last game was one of those games if you were not there to see there is no way to put into words to explain to others."

The prize is not insignificant...a berth to the Gold Nationals. This is the premier tournament for pre-college softball players. The field is limited to 64 teams and the berths are coveted. Several hundred teams compete at a system of sector and regional tournaments to be in the field of 64. Almost all of the big college programs will be at the Gold Nationals, it's a great chance for exposure (an opportunity for a college coach to see you play and recruit you for their program...with a scholarship, you hope!)

But this tournament started crazy and ended crazy. It poured on Friday and looked worse on Sunday. The tournament director was going to try to get the tournament all in on one day. On Sunday, he decided he wanted the qualification to be done on the field. But Saturday night saw heavy rain all through Western Washington. So he thought 'outside the box' meaning across the mountains in Yakima. Seven teams packed up and went on short notice and traveled 125 miles across the mountains. Never heard of such a thing.

But our team prevailed (even though they were the visitor team every single game). Since they lost the first game, they had to wait until the losers bracket played out before the last deciding game. I'm sure it was very late in Yakima with nobody around. The game was over 3 hours long, and they were behind 7-0 by the second inning. Uh oh, not good. But they came back to lead 12-9 going into the bottom of the 7th. The other team had two runners on with two outs. A clean single hit the runner for the third out. What a crazy end.

In the words of the coach "Well I have to say it was the best come back in HISTORY OF FASTPITCH, we played the sliders and we were down 7-0 in the 2nd inning, our girls pulled down deep, found some heart and ended up WINNING 12-10 for a berth to GOLD nationals. We are sooo proud of our girls, and again Caitlin finished the game, we had to put her in after Kelsie gave up 4 runs in the first inning. "

Here's the picture in the middle of the night in Yakima for the Gold Qualifier that started the day before in Seattle. Of course, my husband says that if he had heard that the tournament had moved to Yakima, he would have gone but since he wasn't even willing to go to Ft. Dent earlier, I kind of doubt it. But it is fun to experience this sort of drama, especially if you win.