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Mifflin County knows Series

LEWISTOWN — The Mifflin County Babe Ruth League has had three teams that have finished in the national finals of the World Series. Those were the league’s biggest achievements.

But, the best story occurred 20 years ago in 2002. The Mifflin County 15-year-olds made it to the final six in the country. And nobody had ever dreamed anything like that would happen to this team.

When it comes to 13- and 14-year-olds, Mifflin County has never made it out of district play. It had been beaten by Upper Adams in the district final in 2000 for 13-year-old play and by Gettysburg in a 14-year-old district final back in 2001.

Both tournaments were played in Gettysburg. Gettysburg played a major role in the Civil War, but in 2002 it also played a big part in the fate of the Mifflin County 15-year-olds.

The district tournament in 2002 was played in Milroy for the 15-year-olds and there was only one other team in the tournament, Gettysburg. This time Mifflin County came out on top winning two games to none.

But, as fate would have it, the state tournament was in, of all places, Gettysburg.

And, the first game of the state tournament was against Gettysburg. This time the host won, 6-2.

But, then Mifflin County got hot and earned wins against Southern Wayne County, Franklin Township (Lehighton) and West End of Williamsport.

Those three wins put Mifflin County into the final four. In the first game, Mifflin County won as Phillip Stimley’s RBI single into the fog beat Broomall-Newtown, 3-2, in extra-innings.

That was on a Friday night. On Saturday, the games were rained out. Then on Sunday, Nate Burkey shut out Drexel Hill, 8-0. and Matt Wright came back to beat Gettysburg, 3-1.

The tournament was double elimination and on Monday, Burkey got the call one more time and he responded with a 5-0 shutout of Gettysburg for the state title.

It was the league’s 10th state championship and it reached the Mid-Atlantic Regionals in West Milford, New Jersey.

Once Mifflin County got to the regionals, every game went to extra-innings. First up was Southern New Jersey. Mifflin County won as Teddy Stake had the game-winning hit in the eighth inning.

Against Western New York (Rochester), the game went another eight innings as Wright and AJ Yoder combined for a no-hitter. Yoder got the game-winning hit as Mifflin County won 1-0.

Metro New York was next and the team was from Staten Island. They had been to the previous two World Series as 13- and 14-year-olds. Obviously, they were the favorites to win the regionals.

This time, the game went 11 innings. Stake got the start, but Burkey and Yoder came in relief. Mifflin County pulled out the win 5-2.

Before the championship game, the man running the scoreboard in West Milford said to me, “If this game goes into extra-innings, Mifflin County is going to win.”

He was right.

Mifflin County faced Western New York again. The game went nine innings. Andy King got the winning hit as he delivered a single up the middle that scored Wright.

I called it the longest single in league history (from New Jersey to Indiana) as it put Mifflin County into its first World Series in Connersville, Indiana.

It was a rough start for Mifflin County as it opened against Southern California (El Segundo). The Los Angeles based team made short work of Mifflin County, 18-0, and eventually won the national title.

Next up was Southern Arkansas and this time Mifflin County made short work of them winning 16-0. Mifflin County set a league record with four homers, The blasts came from Brandon Mazzoni, Burkey and Yoder, who hit two, including a grand slam. Wright was the winning pitcher. Playing right field for Southern Arkansas was Travis Wood, who would go on to play in the majors as a pitcher.

Mifflin County’s third game in the pool was the host team, Connersville. Mifflin County pulled out that game as Burkey hit a 3-run homer in the seventh for a 5-4 win.

Wright got the call against Omaha, Nebraska and he went seven innings, giving up just two runs and six hits. The game was tied after seven innings, 2-2. But this time, Mifflin County didn’t come out on top of an extra-inning game and fell 4-2.

With a 2-2 record, Mifflin County made it into single elimination play. But, the team was out of pitching. Or so it thought.

Back then, Babe Ruth had a rule that once your team made it to single elimination, the pitching would start over.

Wright got the call and he came through once again. He gave up only one run on six hits as Mifflin County lost to Tallahassee, Florida, 1-0. Mifflin County had two runners on in the seventh, but couldn’t get them home.

The team was made up of Nate Burkey, Marc Kanagy, Andy King, Zach Rosenberry; Reedsville; Josh Haines, Nathan Powell, Jonathan Worley, Lewistown West; Garrett Dixon, Teddy Stake, Yeagertown; Cody Hartzler, AJ Yoder, Belleville; Phillip Stimely, McVeytown; Matt Wirght, Eric Trego, Belltown and Brandon Mazzoni, Lewistown East.

The manager of the team was Reedsville’s Scott Reigle and his coaches were Scott Wright, Belltown and Bob Rosenberry and Steven Dolin, Reedsville.

“I think what happened between the time this team was 13 and 15 was that the key players, especially the pitchers, matured,” said Reigle. “The team was very well prepared going into the district. All through the tournament, we had good fielding, timely hitting and excellent pitching.”

Burkey was named to the all-tournament team and Wright won a Sportsmanship Award.

Of the five World Series Mifflin County has been to, this one had the most glitz and glamor. They had a host of Cincinnati Reds like George Foster, Tom Browning and Sparky Anderson making guest appearances.

A Connersville native, Betsy Ross, an ESPN anchor at the time, was on hand not to mention, a country western singer, Cheryl Wright and Daniel Rodriguez, who was with the New York Police Department during 9-11 and was billed as ‘Singing Cop’.

And the field, where the games were played, had a waterfall outside the outfield fence.

Three of the players went on to have good college careers. Stake played four years at Division II Lock Haven.

Yoder went on to star at Division I Virginia Military Institute.

Wright became a Division II All-American at Shippensburg University and later was drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays and made it as far as AA.

Looking back, this is one story that never gets old.

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