The Greenfield 12s had to roll out of bed early for a 9 a.m. Sunday elimination game, winning their way into an afternoon game, and then into Monday night's championship game. 

The early game against CIT saw Greenfield take an early lead, and add to it most every inning. Brandon Twigg and Matt Mock pitched two innings apiece, with Samson Hill and Jordan Osborne finishing out the game. 

The score was 9-1 going into the last inning. Greenfield added 5 in the top of the sixth, but CIT had the bottom to attempt a comeback. Osborne made sure they did not. 

The Greenfield 12s came back into action at 1 p.m. against South Hills (The Wild Things).

Greenfield had played The Wild Things in the Riverside Tournament and knew what the team could do, so they jumped out on them early and kept Bryan McCann on the mound for five innings. 

The first inning, the boys in green opportunistically put together a number of hits, walks, and steals. Jordan Osborne started off with a single to right field, and the hits kept coming, all the way through the lineup and back to the top. At the end of that inning, Greenfield was up 6-0. 

McCann kept the batters off-balance, and the right side of the defense saw some good action since most of the South Hills hitters were swinging late on pitches. Brady Sulinski made several good stops at second, and the right and center fielders kept any baserunners honest by getting balls in quickly. 

Both Sulinski and Ethan Heidel-Roberts had good days at the plate, and Jack Heider, as a call-up, helped the cause with a single and a ground-out that moved a runner to third. Sulinski also added the only other run for Greenfield by stealing second, then third on a bad throw, then home on a second error. 

The final score was 7-2. The 12s will now face Brighton Heights in the championship, giving them another chance at the team that slipped away from them in extra innings last Thursday. 

The championship game will be at 8 p.m. at the Greentree complex, Hemlock field. 

The Greenfield team of 11s and 12s lost a close contest to Brawn Jeffrey and then were overrun by 9th Ward, keeping them from advancing in the Morningside tournament. 

The tournament framework had to be switched to double elimination to deal with several games being rained out over the weekend.

Against Brawn Jeffrey, the Greenfielders kept it close through 5 innings of play, heading into the 6th trailing 4-3. Will Szustak put in two innings, giving up only one run, and Tommy Zymanski also took the mound. 

In the field, Marcus Waller had several good plays at shortstop. 

Unfortunately, Greenfield was not able to even things up in the last inning, giving up a few more runs to make the final tally 8-3. 

The game against 9th Ward was a case of one team bringing its "A" game while the other team loses focus. Saturday, 9th Ward was the one bringing their best game, which included hot pitching and a grand slam, ending the game early, 15-2. 

This younger Greenfield team is gaining valuable experience by playing in 12U Tournaments, even though the road has been rough. 

In Saturday action at the Greentree Tournament, the 12s put in a workmanlike performance, piling up runs every inning to stop the game after 4, 13-1. 

Brandon Twigg pitched two scoreless innings, then Matt Mock closed. The defense played strong behind their pitchers, stopping several hot grounders in the infield. Bryan McCann had two nice plays at short, diving to his left to knock down two grounders and popping up to throw out the runners at first. 

McCann also hit two two-run homeruns, one to right center and one to center. He won game MVP honors. 

The boys in green got 3 runs in the first, 2 in the second, 4 in the third, and 4 in the fourth. The last two, completing the 12-run rule, came on a walk-off single by Jordan Osborne.

Greentree did get several nice hits, one that fell onto the chalk-line in right field to stay fair, but they weren't able to put enough of them together to extend the game. 

Missing Luther Harper with an ankle injury and Isaac Koerber, Greenfield called up Garrett White from the 10s. White had a quiet day in left field, but he drove in several runs with an unfieldable ball up the left field line. 

The 12s second game Saturday was rained out, but rescheduled for Sunday morning at 9. If they win, they will play again at 1:00 p.m. Sunday. 

The Greenfield 12s lost a heartbreaker in extra innings to Brighton Heights, July 6, in their first Greentree Tournament action.

The boys in green got a slow start, giving up four runs in the first inning and not getting on the board till the fourth. By the fourth inning, Brighton Heights was up 5-0. 

In the bottom of the fourth with two people on base, though, Samson Hill hit a shot in the gap between center and right to bring two runs in. Then, in the fifth inning, the Brighton Heights pitching started to falter.

With a combination of walks and hits, Greenfield moved three more runs across the plate to tie the game, 5-5. A scoreless sixth inning set up the drama of the seventh. 

Bryan McCann had been shutting down the Brighton Heights bats from the third inning on, giving up only a solo home run in the third. In the seventh, though, a Brighton Heights player hit a hot grounder down the third base line, and then another batter hit to left field, bringing in two runs. 

Facing a two run deficit in the bottom of the seventh, two Greenfield batters went down, one by strikeout and one by ground-out. McCann came up to the plate and hit a high pop up that got him to first when Brighton Heights was not able to field it. Hill then hit a shot off the center field fence that was three feet short of a dinger, getting him to third. 

The score was now 7-6 with the tying run at third. On a 3-2 count, Matt Mock made contact, hitting a tricky chopper to the second baseman. The second baseman bobbled the ball and it rolled away, but the shortstop barehanded it and whipped it sidearm toward first. Mock, with the extra time, got his foot on first before the ball got there. Unfortunately, the field ump saw it differently, turning a wild celebration by the Greenfield crowd into unbelief and boos. 

The Brighton Heights team played well in the field and in the batters box, and in the post-game handshakes, they gave their condolences for the call. Congratulations to them for a game well played. Greenfield hopes to have another chance at them later in the tournament. 

Good job Greenfield for climbing back into the game twice and swinging till the end.