It was a “great” summer session on the baseball diamond for Coach Christian Fulmino and his Hillsborough 9U travel baseball team.
Fulmino’s 9U squad represented the Hillsborough Baseball League this summer while competing in the United States Amateur Baseball League (USABL), winning a league championship, and then adding more hardware to its ledger on July 30 during The Montgomery Covino Tournament.
Hillsborough roared to a 12-2 victory over North Brunswick in the finals of the nine-year-old bracket to be crowned champions.
“It was a great season,” Fulmino said. “The team did very well. We’ve been doing well the last couple of years. The kids worked hard. They’re great kids.”
Helping coach the 9U squad were assistant coaches Sam Rozycki, Brian Wheeler and Marko Miladinov.
The 11 players on the Hillsborough 9U summer squad are Connor Rozycki, John Miladinov, Alex Wheeler, Michael Feltre, Leo Murray, Vincent Fulmino, Jack Suarez, Oliver Eschenroeder, Miles Dawes, Joseph Gubitosa and Jacob Ibrahim.
In its journey to winning a USABL summer league championship, Hillsborough claimed the top spot in the New Jersey 9U West Division with a record of 8-2-1.
Hillsborough defeated the North Hunterdon Youth Baseball squad 8-2 on July 27 to claim its summer league championship.
Fulmino lauded his team’s “great” pitching and defense for being a key factor in them winning a summer league championship.
“We won a lot of games playing clean baseball,” Fulmino said. “We had great pitching and defense and got clutch hits at the right time to score runs.”
The final tournament Hillsborough competed in during its 2021 summer session was The Montgomery Covino Tournament that was hosted by the Montgomery Baseball League at its McKnight Complex.
Hillsborough went 3-1 in pool play to advance to the semifinals, where they were matched up against Edison. Dialing up a 6-2 victory over Edison pushed Hillsborough into the finals to face off against North Brunswick.
The bats were on fire for Hillsborough from the first inning on in the championship game, jumping out to a 4-0 lead in the first inning.
It was a big fourth inning at the plate for Hillsborough as they struck for six runs. Hillsborough added two more runs in the fifth inning to put them up 12-2 and win the game because of the 10-run mercy rule.
“We had a good game on both sides,” Fulmino said of the championship victory.
Overall, Hillsborough racked up a record of 21-12-1 this summer while competing in the USABL and other tournaments.
Having coached this group of Raiders for the last three years, Fulmino said the “best part” has been watching his players improve on the diamond each year and having fun.
A big step in that process for Fulmino was when his team made it to the 8U state championship game last year.
By collecting a championship in The Montgomery Covino Tournament to end this summer, Fulmino sees his squad taking the next step in its journey.
It’s something Fulmino feels his team can build on during the fall travel season and also next year when his players move up to the 10U level.
“We’re positioned well to hit the ground running this fall and continue this success,” he said.