Southern Indiana Spikes

The athletic field is where the kids learn the lessons of life and have fun. They learn that winning isn’t as important as preparing to win… They learn never to give up… They learn to lose with dignity… They learn to win with honor…They learn that you can be whatever you want to be if you work hard enough at it… They may never be first-team or all-state or an all-American, but the important thing is that they try…They learn to be good citizens… It’s better to be a good American than an all-American.

The Southern Indiana Spikes 9U team won the Baseball Players Association Northern Zone World Series held in Owensboro, Kentucky July 26th - 30th. The team started the series on Thursday with wins over the Kentucky Bobcats and the Western Kentucky Bulldogs. Then on Friday, they defeated the Evansville Triplets in their only game of the day. This moved them into the championship game of the "winners bracket" slated for Saturday evening. This game would not turn out as well as the previous games for the Spike 9U's as they were defeated by the Evansville Spikes. This forced the team into the losers bracket and potentially one loss away from tournament elimination. The Spikes then would need to win three straight games to come back. They then beat the Evansville Triplets for the second time in the series. This set the stage for the finals: Southern Indiana Spikes vs. the Evansville Spikes in the Championship game on Sunday. The first game was a nail bitter with the Southern Indiana Spikes winning 4-2. This forced the "if needed" winner take all final game. That game held up the billing as a championship game at it's finest. Evansville took the lead 1 -0 in the first inning and added another run in the second inning. The Spikes then took the lead 3-2 in the third inning. Evansville scored two more runs to take the lead 4-3 in the top of the 5th inning. This put the Southern Indiana Spikes with their backs against the wall down to their last three outs in the bottom of the sixth inning. Trevor Lehr then hit a lead off single to start the last inning. Tyler Ward then followed up with another single to put runners on first and second. Gavin Schaefer hit an one RBI single to center field to pull the Spikes within one run. With runners on first and second Mason Becher sacrifice bunted and moved the runners to second and third with one out. Caleb Sabelhaus then steps to the plate with a game winning double for a final score of 6-5. The Spikes 9U finish their season with a final record of 33-10. The Southern Indiana Spikes 9U's competed in 10 tournaments and placed either first or second in eight of those ten. Way to go Spikes 9U!!!

The Spikes 12U’s traveled to Noblesville, Indiana (on the north side of Indianapolis) to participate in their final tournament of the 2006 baseball season…the Mid-America 12U Championships. These are held at the Noblesville Youth Baseball’s “Field of Dreams”, an 8 field complex. This is a very nice facility located just behind Hazel-Dell Elementary near Noblesville and historically has drawn some very good competitive travel teams in the past and this year was no different. The Spikes ended up #5 seed after 3 rounds of pool play. They then faced a familiar foe, the host team “Noblesville Heat”. After six innings the team won 7-2 moving on to the semi-finals where they faced a team from Warren County Indiana called the Angels. This game ended up being a pitching dual as the Spikes scored two runs in the first inning and that would be all that crossed the plate the rest of the game as the Spikes won 2-0. This sent the boys to Sunday and the championship game at high noon. The Hamilton Southeastern Blue was there to meet them to do battle for the title. The game started out with the Spikes batting in the top of the first and had the first run of the game cross the plate but the runner was called back to third on a questionable ground rule double call by the home plate umpire. HSE managed to get one run in the bottom of the first inning but left bases loaded due to some great pitching/defense by the Spikes. The game remained 1-0 until the bottom of the 5th where two runners for HSE, a walk and a K-ob, crossed home plate on some pass balls/wild pitches to make the score 3-0. The boys were unable to get anything going in the top of the sixth so the game ended on a final score of 3-0. The Spikes only allowed one hit the entire game while recording only two hits of their own. While batting, the Spikes had only two strikeouts for the game and putting the ball in play during most every at bat, but the ball seemed to go right to the defensive players….and so goes baseball. What a great season these boys had, the team ended with a final overall record of 35-12…WOW! They participated in 9 travel tournaments and placed in 8 out of the 9….amazing! They had a first place finish in three of them, second place in two, third place in two more and a fourth in one. Way to go 12U Spikes!!!

The Southern Indiana Spikes 10U finished their 2006 season in style. They brought home 3rd place trophies from the BPA World Series held at Jack Fisher Park in Owensboro, KY July 27-30. After dropping into the losers bracket early, this team made an amazing run all the way back to the semi-finals by winning six straight games. These boys never gave up and continued to battle until the final out was made, playing three straight games on Sunday in the 100+ degree heat. The 2006 BPA World Series fielded 18 teams representing Kentucky, Ohio, Michigan & Indiana in the 10U age division.