Evil Sports Wins USSSA Class E National Qualifier

Fourteen Teams Participate At Inwood Complex In Joliet On Aug. 6 & 7

Evil Sports Chapions Of USSSA Class E In Joliet On August 6th & 7th

JOLIET: Evil Sports (6-1) from Joliet rebounded from losing their second game of the fourteen team, USSSA Men's Class E National Qualifying Tournament held at the Inwood Sports Complex in Joliet on August 6th and 7th to win five games in a row including a double dipping of winner's bracket champion One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar (3-2) to win the title. Village Pub (3-2) from Kankakee finished in third place, the Beavers (3-2) from Bolingbrook took home fourth place with a fifth place tie going to both Nasty Naybors (3-2) from Bolingbrook and Collins Street Auto Parts (2-2) from Joliet.
Evil Sports opened play in this tournament with a first round bye before taking on and defeating the nasty Naybors 9-1 in the second round to advance in the bracket. Evil Sports was led in this win by the hitting of Joseph Fiedler 2-4 with 2 RBI, David Miller 3-4, and Jeff Heitman 3-3 during this victory. Nasty Naybors had won their first round game over Collins Street Auto Parts 10-9 to advance into this game with Evil Sports.
Evil Sports stubbed their toe in the next game losing to Village Inn 7-4 in spite of the hitting of Fiedler 2-3, Miller 3-4, and Jason Mussatto 2-3. Village Inn had advanced to this game by defeating Lockwood Furnace from Joliet 15-3 in the first round and than stopping Windy City Grill from Chicago 10-4 in the second round of play.
Now playing in the loser's bracket on Sunday morning Evil Sports met and defeated Collins Street Auto Parts in a close game 7-6 to advance in the bracket. Evil Sports top hitters in this game were Fiedler 4-4 with 2 RBI, Miller 2-4 with 2 RBI, Heitman 2-3 with 2 RBI including game winning RBI in bottom of seventh inning and Jack Lange 3-3.
The Evil Sports ball club next sent home the Beavers after administering a 22-6 thumping onto them as they continued their march toward the title. The Evil Sports ball club were led at the plate during this game by the hitting of Dennis Balazs 5-5, J. Fiedler 3-3 with 7 RBI, Kevin Gniadek 4-5 with 3 RBI, Lange 4-5 with 3 RBI, Will Fiedler 3-5, Mussatto 3-4 and Juan Gomez 3-5.
Now the Evil Sport ball club was presented with the opportunity to extract some revenge over the team that had put them into the loser's bracket earlier in the tournament, Village Inn. Evil Sports took full advantage of this chance as they sent Village Inn to the parking lot to pack their cars for the trip back home after beating them 9-6 behind the hitting of J. Fiedler 2-3, Miller 3-3 with 3 RBI, Heitman 2-4 with 2 RBI, and Balazs 3-4. This win gave Evil Sports the title to the loser's bracket and also more importantly qualified them to play the One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar in the championship game.
Evil Sports made a strong defensive statement as the shut down the previously unbeaten One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar ball club 5-1 to force the playing of the 'if necessary game' in order to determine which of these two remaining ball clubs would be the champion. Evil Sports were led at the plate in this win by the hitting of Gomez 2-3, Lange 3-3, and W. Fiedler 2-2.
In the extra ball game it was Evil sports slipping past the One Timers/30 Buck Sports Ball team 8-6 to take the title to this tournament home with them. The top offensive performers in this game for Evil Sports were Balazs 3-4, Miller 2-4 with 3 RBI, Gniadek 2-3, Lange 2-2, and W. Fiedler 2-3.
Evil Sports manager Joseph Fiedler said, "I just want to say we had to work our butts off to win this tournament. We played a lot of great teams. We had to really scratch and have some luck to rattle off the five straight wins here on Sunday."
For the tournament the Evil Sports ball club top hitters were Jack Lange .783 with 5 RBI, Joseph Fiedler .682 with 13 RBI, Dennis Balazs .571, David Miller .560 with 12 RBI, Will Fiedler .542, Jeff Heitman .522 with 7 RBI, and Kevin Gniadek with 7 RBI.
Tournament runner up the One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar made it to the championship game by winning the winner's bracket as they received a first round bye before beating Capers bar & Grill from Joliet 11-2 in the second round of tournament play. Capers won their first round game over the Yard Dogs from Plano who failed to field a team at game time in this tournament.
In the third round it was One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar over the Beavers by the final score of 9-4 to put One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar into the winner's bracket finals. The Beavers made it to this game undefeated by opening the tournament with a 21-5 win over Fabri-Tek from Aurora in the first round of play and than stopping Kro-Hop 12-3 in the second round of tournament play.
In the game between the last two remaining unbeaten team in this tournament One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar squared off with the Village Inn and when the dust settled back down on the infield after the last out had been recorded the scoreboard read One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar 12 and the Village Inn 8 giving the Joliet ball the title to the winner's bracket.
Now One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar had to sit and wait as the loser's bracket was complete before they would know which of the remaining teams would win and earn the right to play them in the championship game. After the play of the loser's bracket had been completed it was One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar against Evil Sports in the title game.
One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar could not get that last win that they needed to claim the title at this tournament as they were beaten twice by Evil Sports 5-1 and 807 to force One Timers/30 Buck Sports Bar to accept the second place prize package from this tournament.