Bulldogs Walk Off With Championship

The Newtown Bulldogs, a U9 baseball team, capped off their Route 84 Tournament championship run with a walk-off hit to beat Monroe 12-11 in the final weekend of July.

Leading up to the championship game, the Bulldogs faced off with Monroe early in tournament play.  Newtown came away with a decisive 15-3 win. Fairfield was next up for the Bulldogs. In what turned out to be a marathon game, the locals came home with a 22-15 win. Next, was the much anticipated matchup against the Newtown Hawks. In a classic game of evenly-matched teams, the Bulldogs took the game in extra innings, 11-10.

One week after handedly beating Monroe, the two teams would face off once again. The Bulldogs took an early, commanding lead but Monroe would not allow the hometown team the title without a fight. Taking a chapter from the Bulldog playbook, Monroe chipped away at Newtown’s early lead. By the middle of the sixth inning, Newtown found itself locked in another nail-biting finish. With the game tied, the bottom of the order stepped up to set the stage for the winning run to cross the plate. With one out and runners on second and third, a ball hit to the first base side of the diamond brought in the winning run from third.

The Bulldogs had one motto that carried them throughout the season, “Win as a team, lose as a team.” Newtown’s early-season loses helped the team prepare for their late season run. Pitching and defense always kept the Bulldogs in the game but when the bats came alive the Bulldogs were a team poised for championship play.

From the top of the lineup to the bottom, the offense was aggressive at the plate as well as on the bases. The pitchers kept opposing batters in check, while the gloves in the field backed them up.  The Bulldogs were made up of a mix of rookies of travel play and veterans of one year and came together with two common objectives: learn fundamentals and have fun.