Just two teams are now left at the 15U National Team Championships in Arizona. With Next Level Baseball and Stacked National each vying for gold medals at the Championship bout on Monday, both won their way through the quarterfinals and semifinals on Sunday in Surprise, Arizona. Meanwhile, Legacy Baseball Group and 5 Star Arizona will square off in the bronze medal match before the gold medal game.
Click here to view updates and scores from throughout this year’s tournament and click here to view live scores from each and every game.
Quarterfinals
To kick off the quarters in Surprise, Arizona, Legacy Baseball Black survived against a late TB SoCal rally to move onto the semis with a close 8-7 win. Legacy started the round off by taking a 3-0 lead in the top of the first and followed it with two runs in the third and three in the fifth. After holding an 8-5 lead heading into the final frame, TB SoCal almost pulled off a heroic bottom of the seventh comeback, but Legacy held on for the win.
Next Level Baseball downed the Long Beach Bears by a much more comfortable margin. Winning by a final line of 8-2, Next Level pulled away from its opponents with a 5-run seventh frame after leading the Bears by just one run heading into the final inning.
Like Legacy Baseball, 5 Star Arizona won its way to the semifinals with a one-run victory in the quarters. Defeating Swarm Red Elite National 7-6, 5 Star Arizona walked off Swarm in an epic extra-innings win. After Swarm trailed for most of the game, the team mounted a four-run comeback over the sixth and seventh frames that sent the bout into extras. While Swarm put up a run in the eighth, 5 Star West loaded the bases and walked off its opponents to move on to the next round.
Stacked National moved past the quarterfinals with a dominant shutout over CBA Bulldogs National. After plating 12 in its first three frames against CBA, Stacked run-ruled the Bulldogs after just four frames. While its offense was rolling, its starting pitcher, Paxton Czubeck, threw a complete four frames of shutout ball while only allowing three hits and one free pass.
Semifinals
Stacked National continued its shoutout ball all the way into the semifinals with an 8-0 rout over 5 Star Arizona. While 5 Star heroically defeated Swarm Red Elite in the quarterfinals, it was stymied by yet another impressive Stacked pitcher in the semis.
Starting pitcher Aidan Dahlk built on an already-great 15U Champs tournament by flaming five scoreless frames, only allowing four hits and three walks while sending his squad to the championship round. On offense, Stacked consistently tacked on runs until it put its second run-rule of the day into effect, punching its ticket to the gold medal game at Surprise on Monday.
On the other side of the bracket, Next Level Baseball had a much tougher time in getting to the championship round on Monday. Locked into a shootout with Legacy Baseball on the next field over, Next Level outpaced its opponents in a barnburning 12-8 win.
Next Level had to work to pull itself out of a third-inning 5-0 deficit. However, it eventually took a lead via a five-run fifth frame and refused to give it up. Next Level both widened the gap and held off Legacy despite its two-run seventh-inning rally that Next Level put a stop to to clinch its four-run win and ice its berth in the championships on Monday.
