By Robert Thomas

The 2009 AAYBA Texas World Series Tournament in Flower Mound, Texas wrapped up a week of 700 games in thrilling fashion with Saturday night’s championship games, including the wins by the Dallas Patriots and the Rockwall F/R Blue Sox in the Platinum title games.

F/R Blue Sox (Rockwall, Texas) 11, Gladiators BB (Beaumont, Texas) 3
 The 13-and-under Platinum tournament title came down to two of the tournament’s top seeds, with the F/R Blue Sox walking away with a run-rule victory in four innings over a solid Gladiators BB squad in the finals.
 The Blue Sox, the Platinum North champions, scored in every inning of the contest to finish the tournament with a perfect 7-0 record.
 “We played well for this whole tournament and I thought we played one of our better games in the title game,” said Blue Sox coach Andy Westmoreland. “Our hitting really took over tonight and we needed it, we were facing a good solid team in the Gladiators.”
 The Blue Sox struck first in the contest, getting an RBI single from Cole Ballew to score Omar Salinas for a 1-0 lead after one inning.
 The Gladiators, however, responded with two runs in the top of the second for a 2-1 edge. Brayden Griffin drove in one run with a single, while Collin Bergason plated Jordan Gore (2-for-2) with a groundout for the other.
 That lead didn’t last as the Blue Sox scored three times in the bottom of the frame to reclaim the lead at 4-2.
 R.J. Williams drove in Russell Hughes with a sacrifice fly for the first run, followed by an RBI bunt single from Alex Irion to score Russell Hughes. Jonathan Soberanes closed out the frame with a run-scoring hit to plate Irion.
 The Blue Sox then added three more runs in the third inning, despite having play stopped for almost 10 minutes when a family of skunks wandered into center field. Two of the three runs came when batters were hit with pitches with the bases loaded, while Chris Chambers plated Chris Glover with a groundout for the other run.
 The game’s final touches came during a four-run fourth inning for the Blue Sox, highlighted by a monster two-run home run by Russell Hughes. Ashley Dukes added an inside the park home run, followed by an RBI single from Ballew.
 All the offense wasn’t lost on Salinas, as he racked up seven strikeouts and scattered five hits in four innings for the win.
 Getting multi-hit games for the Blue Sox was Dukes, Glover and Ballew.

Dallas Patriots 7, Knoxville (Tennessee) Stars 0
 After Friday’s impressive win over the East Cobb Stars from Georgia, the Dallas Patriots showed they may have saved their best for last in the 11-and-under Platinum division title game with an shutout win over the Knoxville Stars.
 The Patriots, the Platinum South champions, rode a perfect combination of stellar pitching and big hitting to finish Flower Mound tournament undefeated.
 “I am just so proud of these kids, they did a great job in the games we played,” said Dallas Patriots coach Logan Stout. “We knew this was going to be a tough team to play and the kids responded and played really well.”
 The pitching took center stage for the Patriots against the Stars, as a trio of Patriot hurlers held the Stars to just four hits in seven innings.
 Starter Decker Branch was strong early with three hitless innings to start, finishing with three strikeouts and just one hit allowed in four innings for the win. Relievers Michael Neustifter and Jordan Roberts (three strikeouts in two innings) combined over the last three innings to finish the shutout.
 “The way our guys pitched in this tournament was great,” Stout said.
 The offense for the Patriots wasn’t too shabby either, including single runs in the first and second innings for an early 2-0 lead.
 Ryan Cash started the first inning with a double and scored on a sacrifice fly from Neustifter. Roberts then doubled to open the second inning and scored two batters later on a wild pitch.
 But the game’s biggest hit came in the fourth inning, as Branch rang out a two-run single to score Kameron Steen and Roberts for a 4-1 edge.
 The defense also had a big role in the game, including a slick 4-6-3 double play from Jacob Sandoval, Cash and Chandler Fidel to crush a Knoxville rally in the top of the fourth inning.
The Patriots then put the game away in the final innings, scoring once in the fifth and twice in the sixth for a seven-run lead.
 Neustifter notched his second RBI of the game in the fifth with a two-out triple to score Austin DeLeon. In the sixth, Steen blasted an RBI triple to score Jose Taylor while Fidel brought in Steen with a clean single to left field.
 The Knoxville Stars were paced by Trey Hinton (2-for-3), Paul Bolden and Alex Murrell in the loss.

10 other squads crowned champions at Flower Mound
 While the spotlight shined on the Platinum division at the end of the tournament 10 baseball teams found their own level of hardware in five divisions of the 11 and 13-year age groups.
 In 13-and-under play, the Dbat Mustangs Red claimed a thrilling 19-14 win over the Flower Mound Warriors in the Diamond division title game.
 In the Gold division final, it was the Traction Red squad picking up am 8-6 victory over the Oklahoma Warriors.
 The Silver division title went to the Texas Red Sox after a solid 6-1 win over Arsenal Baseball.
 In the Copper title match, El Stickmen came away with the championship after a 8-7 nailbiting win over the Redhawks.
 Wrapping up the championships in 13-and-under was the Bronze title game, which went to the Texas Hitmen (Kyle, Texas) with wild 8-7 victory over the Outlaws (Haltom City, Texas).
 Moving into 11-and-under play, the Diamond division title went to the Cypress Sharks (Houston, Texas) after a hard-fought 5-4 victory over the Keller Aces (Keller, Texas).
 The Gold division title was decided between Texas Stars Blue and Marshalls, with Marshalls coming away with a wild 12-9 win and the title.
 In the fight for the Silver division title, the Cy-Fair Dragons (Cypress, Texas) emerged with a 6-1 decision over the Cedar Hill Xtreme.
 In the Copper division final Texas Sports Black wrapped its third-straight win with a 9-6 victory over the Texas Bandits.
 And in the final division title match, the Waxahachie Warriors claimed the Bronze division title with an 8-3 win over the Denton Scorpions.

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