mobanmarketWILLIAMSPORT, PA — The field is set for the 2019 Little League World Series, and eight teams will compete for a chance to defend the U.S. title.
Perennial powerhouse Hawaii, which won the 2018 championship over South Korea, is back after sweeping in the West regional tournament and will play Louisiana, representing the Southwest region, in its first game. Representing New England, Rhode Island will play Southeast regional champion, Virginia, and Minnesota, the Midwest regional winner, will take on Kentucky, representing the Great Lakes. Finally, Oregon, representing the Northwest region, will play the Mid-Atlantic winner, New Jersey.
The first slate of games will begin Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern time. The games will air on ESPN and ABC.
Here are five things to know about the teams in this year’s field.
1. The Elmora Troopers, based out of Elizabeth, New Jersey, play on a field named after Trooper Thomas Hanratty, according to NJ.com. The 24-year-old Elizabeth native played in the league growing up. He was hit by a car and killed while performing a traffic stop in Summit, New Jersey, in 1992. The players wear his badge number, 4971, on their jerseys.
2. Minnesota’s Maddie Freking became just the 19th girl to ever appear in the Little League World Series, and the first to do it since Philadelphia fireballer Mo’ne Davis took the sport by storm in 2014. The Coon Rapids Andover Little League all-star is also the first Minnesota girl to play in the tournament since Krissy Wendell did it in 1994 with the Brooklyn Center American League all-stars.
Freking, who is listed as a second-basemen, did not collect a hit in her eight plate appearances in the regional tournament. She walked once and struck out five times.
In an Aug. 10 regional championship game against Iowa, with her team down four runs in the fourth inning and the bases loaded, Freking snared a screaming line drive out of the air at second base and doubled up a runner at third. Minnesota went on to win the game and earned a trip to the Little League World Series in the process.
3. Carson McNally, a player on Oregon’s Sprague Little League all-star team who didn’t make the team last year, was called upon in the state championship and managed to get the final out with a full count and bases loaded, according to the Salem Reporter.
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“That kid to me is the Disney story,” Little League Manager Travis Price told the newspaper.
Instead of getting discouraged, McNally worked hard to make the team and threw a curveball for a strike at a pivotal moment to win the game.
“Basically, a kid who never pitched closed the state championship game and won,” said Price.
4. Two players on Kentucky’s Bowling Green East all-stars, Grayson Newman and Cameron Obee, watched their older brothers play in the Little League World Series in 2015 and 2016, according to BG Daily news.
In 2015, Kentucky lost to California, rattled off back-to-back wins over Oregon and South Carolina in elimination games, and then lost to California a second time in an elimination game. A year later, Kentucky won its first two games over Texas and Iowa, then lost its next to games to New York and Tennessee.
5. The Loudon South Little League all-stars are the first Virginia team to make it to the Little League World Series since 1994, according to the Washington Post.
And it almost didn’t happen. The team, losing by one run and down to its final out in a semi-final matchup against Georgia, needed a hit from Chase Obstgarten with two runners on base. He delivered a triple to win the game, according to the Loudon Times-Mirror.