13-YEAR-OLD BABE RUTH
By: Tim Falls
The Hopewell 13-year-old Babe Ruth baseball team has prevailed against rivals from District One, defeated challengers from Southern New Jersey and now bested all its opposition in the Babe Ruth Middle Atlantic Regional Tournament.
All that’s left is the World Series.
Hopewell defeated Branchburg, 12-4, in the Babe Ruth Middle Atlantic Regional Championship game at the Harding Crossing Complex in Medford Tuesday night and advanced to the Babe Ruth 13-year-old World Series starting Aug. 17 in Loudon County, Virginia. Hopewell is slated to take on the Ohio Valley Regional Champions at 1 p.m. next Friday.
"It is extremely special for this group of kids that I’ve been with for five years," said Hopewell manager Jim Patnick. "It’s great to finally see them achieve a goal they’ve always wanted to achieve and do it in a fashion with dignity and respect for the game."
Hopewell has had a successful history in the regional tournament, with this group of 13-year-old baseball players taking second in the regional tournament when they competed as a 10-year-old team. This Hopewell team won the Southern New Jersey Championship as 9-year-olds, 10-year-olds and 11-year-olds and hosted the regional tournament as 12-year-olds.
"We’ve been here the past four years so it’s not new to us," said lead-off batter John Croak after Hopewell’s 7-4 victory over Cherry Hill in the regional semifinal. "We know what to expect."
The regional tournament may have been nothing new, but the World Series sure is and Hopewell can expect even tougher teams than those it has faced thus far.
Hopewell went undefeated in the regional tournament and has won the past 15 games.
"Right now, we’re pretty solid at everything," said Jason Patnick, who pitched seven innings for the win in the regional championship. "We’ve played really well because we got good looks at their pitches and made their pitchers work. We’ve done really well running the bases and in our fielding."
In the championship game, Evan Miller doubled to drive in Croak and Patnick, who singled to start off the game.
"Just like in many of our games through District, State and Regional play," said coach Patnick, "John Croak, Jason Patnick and Evan Miller combined for three consecutive hits and we started off with two quick runs."
Branchburg, a team Hopewell had already defeated, 19-8, during the pool play round of the tournament, scored one run in the top of the third to trail, 2-1, but that’s as close as the team from Somerset County came. Hopewell answered back with a run in the bottom of the third inning and added five more in the bottom of the fourth before scoring four runs in the fifth inning.
Mike Hartel had two big hits as Hopewell tacked on runs. Hartel went 2-for-3 with three RBIs. Miller went 3-for-4 with two RBIs and three runs scored, Nick Gies had two RBIs and Drew Crivelli had an RBI and scored twice.
"We were very much in control the entire game," said coach Patnick. "Our pitcher, Jason Patnick, got of to a good start, mixing up his pitches. The other team, from the very beginning, was having trouble hitting the ball."
Hopewell edged Cherry Hill, the Southern New Jersey runner-up, in the Middle Atlantic Regional semfinal, 7-4. It was the closest a team has come to upsetting Hopewell.
Nick Gies started the game as Hopewell’s pitcher and held Cherry Hill scoreless for three innings.
"It was a lot of pressure," said Gies. "I just tried to throw strikes and keep their hitters off-balance and just have my fielders help me out."
Hopewell defeated Cherry Hill, 9-4, to win the Southern New Jersey Championship, but Cherry Hill advanced along with Medford, the host team, and proved more troublesome in the second encounter.
"They came out harder," said Gies. "They did way better than they did in the state tournament. It was a lot more pressure, but we tend to do well in the pressure situations."
Miller came in to replace Gies on the mound in the fifth after Cherry Hill began to rally. Gies almost got out of the inning, but a call on a tag at third that Hopewell fans disagreed with, allowed Cherry Valley to score several runs.
Miller struck out three and had help from his fielders to keep Cherry Hill scoreless in the last two innings.
"It felt good," said Miller. "I was feeling good. I haven’t pitched for a while, I was just on. I knew my fielders would back me up. I had a lot of confidence in them and I knew we would do well."
Hopewell started the game strong, as Patnick tripled in Croak and scored off a hit by Miller. The powerful bats Hopewell displayed at the top of its order earned plenty of respect. Miller was intentionally walked in one of his at bats, and Hopewell took the opportunity offered by the lazy pitches to steal third.
Hopewell’s fielders prevented a lot of scoring chances with smart plays and clutch catches. Brooks Backinoff in centerfield caught several outs, including the last.
"Our defense and our hitting our about equal," said Backinoff, "and our defense is always solid. This is probably our best year. It’s a really big accomplishment to come this far, especially on the big field. We’ve gone pretty far the past few years, but it’s never been like this."
Hopewell dominated pool play, defeating FNHA, the Metro New York Champion, 17-10, on Friday.
The District One winners went on to defeat Bethelehem, N.Y., 11-1, on Saturday with Gies accounting for three RBI and Dylan Yuska and Miller knocking in two runs each. Patnick went 2-for-2 with an RBI and three runs scored. Hartel went 2-for-2 with a run scored.
On Sunday, Hopewell blanked Bear, Del., 10-0, and defeated Branchburg, 19-8.
"The reason the score turned out in our favor," said coach Patnick, "was because our kids played really well."
Croak went 3-for-3 with two RBIs and three runs scored in the win over Bear. Patnick went 4-for-4 with three runs scored Backinoff drove in three runs and Miller, Crivelli and Gies all had an RBI.
In Hopewell’s first victory over Branchburg, Crivelli struck out two batters in three innings of work before Hartel came in and struck out two as well with the game ending in the fifth inning because of the 10-run mercy rule.
Hopewell scored 11 runs to end the game in the fifth.
Croak and Miller had three RBIs each. Croak went 4-for-5 with three runs scored and Miller scored twice. Patnick went 2-for-4 with an RBI and three runs scored, while Yuska went 3-for-3 with two RBIs and two runs scored. Backinoff, Crivelli, Gies, Hartel and Keith Devlin all had an RBI, while Devlin and Gies scored twice and Hartel and Backinoff scored once.
With the offense obviously providing plenty of support, Hopewell’s defense did its job in stopping the opposition.
"We have a lot of pitchers that are good," said Miller. "We have a lot of confidence in our pitching staff. Our defense is really good too. We all have confidence in each other because we’ve been playing together for so long."
That time together seems to be well spent and has turned this team of 13-year-olds into a group of champions.
"You never have expectations of going this far," said coach Patnick. "The most important thing is that the kids learn from this experience of playing at this high level of baseball."

