Gainesville little leaguers take NOVA tournament
By Dan Roem
Kids playing for the 10-and-under Gainesville Cannons Little League baseball travel team learned a crucial life lesson late last month and may have taught some adults the same one: Never give up. The Cannons pulled out three consecutive game winners after trailing each game at the Longhorn tournament in Ashburn, March 28-30, to win the 16-team invitational tournament.
Most impressively, the youngsters rallied to score six runs with two outs in the bottom of the sixth inning in the championship to defeat the Virginia Bruins 8-7.
“I’ve never been a part of anything like this,” said long-time coach Troy Toureau.
“When they got down, I kept saying to them…not to give up, that we were going to win this game,” the coach added, though he confessed that even as he said that, he had his doubts.
With two outs and Nick Rauber standing on first base, Matt Scott socked an RBI double to right field that closed the gap to 7-3 in the bottom of the final inning.
From there, the Gainesville offense just got batty.
Nick Drury followed up with a line drive into the outfield to bring in Scott. Tanner Heltibridle then singled in Drury.
With Heltibridle on third base and new addition to the team Shane Buss on second, Toureau’s son Tim, who had pitched during the top half of the inning, came to the plate.
“The father in me took over,” said the elder Toureau, who recalled thinking, “Ahh, he’s going to get the last out.”
Instead, with the count full, 10-year-old Tim took ball four at the plate to load the bases for Landon Avila.
Like Drury, Avila cranked a line drive single to score Heltebridle and, suddenly, the game was knotted at 7-7.
That’s when James Beasley roped a shot down the right field line, well over the first baseman’s head, to knock home Buss for the win.
“I don’t want to sound corny, but, yeah, no matter what’s ahead of you, if you hang in there, you can accomplish anything,” reckoned Toureau. “It’s not only baseball you don’t give up at.”
The game-winning run was Buss’s second of the tournament, as he had done the same in the quarter-finals on a suicide squeeze bunt placed perfectly by Beasley between third base and the pitcher’s mound.
Buss batted .545 in the tournament by smacking six singles in 11 at bats. He also earned six RBIs for his efforts.
Speaking of new additions, outfielder Hayden Lilek provided a boost for Gainesville, too, as he darted home on a sacrifice fly by Austin Gerber to clinch a 9-8 victory over the Lakeshore Baysocks of Maryland in the semi-finals.
Gerber led the team in run production throughout the tournament, driving in 10.
The lefty Heltebridle got credit for hitting the strongest shot of the weekend, smashing a shot off of the right-field fence with the wind blowing toward him.
“He’s just a strong kid,” Toureau said. “He swings the bat hard.”
Even though he’s the undisputed power king of the team, Toureau’s favorite aspect of the young gun is his “great temperament.
“The funny thing about Tanner is [he’s] just very mild-mannered,” noted the coach. “[He’s] just a very low-keyed kid.”
One of the other new members on the team, Tyler Featheroff, has also provided assistance to Gainesville in a big way by reliving Rauber from catching duties half of the time. Last season, Rauber caught just about every pitch.
“Hopefully those two will become good teammates because they’ll be able to really rely on each other and work together as a team,” said the coach.