DeKalb 5 & 6 Year Old Tigers Place Third in Weekend Tournament

Updated: July 21, 2014

It was a good weekend for the 5 & 6 year old Tigers this weekend, as the team traveled to Murfreesboro for the second straight weekend to compete in TYBA’s State Championship. Last weekend the team finished 2-2 in the State Rec League tournament, but faired even better in the historically tougher tournament this weekend, which was an “open” tournament allowing more travel teams to compete. The Tigers ended up 4-1 in the tournament; good enough to claim 3rd place.

DC began the tournament well, defeating the Algood All-stars 23-3 Friday night. Mother nature did her best to spoil the weekend Saturday, as torrential rainfall overnight Friday and Saturday morning delayed the tournament approximately 5 hours.

When they did start, the Tigers didn’t disappoint.

In a border rivalry, the Black and White took on Warren County to begin the day’s action. The Tigers started slowly but rallied to defeat the Pioneer All-stars 11-6.

The delay seemingly took an effect on all teams, fans and even officials Saturday night as tensions flared in an action filled contest when DC met the Smyrna Dirtdogs for the top seed in their respective pool. It was a back and forth game all night, with both teams playing good defense and getting timely hits. DeKalb found itself trailing 10-7 going into the bottom half of the fourth, but the Tigers scored 8 runs to take a 15-13 advantage heading into the final inning of play.

Smyrna would rally, scoring 3 runs with one out, but DeKalb would turn a double play to end the threat and the game, defeating the Dirtdogs, 15-13.

Sunday’s action was just as thrilling as DeKalb took on the Huntland All-star team to begin the single elimination portion of the tournament. Again, both teams would exchange leads multiple times in the contest and the game was tied going before DeKalb won the game 17-16 on a RBI single.

With the win DeKalb advanced to the semi-final round of the tournament. Unfortunately, the Black and Gold’s hot streak would end in a loss to the Lasscassas Muckdogs, 15-9.

The loss ended the Tigers’ season, however the young DeKalb team showed well all throughout both tournaments, going a combined 6-3 for both tournaments.