Wylie Little League’s regular season may have ended, but that doesn’t mean baseball is over.
Baseball fans still had the District Tournament (June), All-Stars (June and July) and the Texas West State Tournament (July), which made for a busy start to the summer.
For the third year in a row, Wylie will host the Texas West State Tournament at its ballpark near Kirby Lake. This year the dates will be July 13-18.
The Wylie Little League All-Star teams were hoping to be playing in that tournament. But first they have to win the District All-Star Tournament and the Sectional Tournament. We will have all the details on Wylie’s All-Star teams in the next issue of Wylie Growl.
Before All-Star teams were formed, the Wylie Little League team’s who finished in the top three or four spots in their regular season divisions qualified to play in the City Tournament. The winner of the City Tournament played the winner of the County Tournament to crown a District 5 Champ.
Two Wylie teams earned the District 5 Championship in the early weeks of June: The Wylie Purple Team won the Junior Division and the Wylie Cubs won the Majors Division.
Here’s a look at how the Wylie teams did in the single-elimination tournament.
Juniors
The Wylie Purple team won the District 5 Juniors Championship to cap off a great season.
The Purple Team started the tournament by beating the Northern Rangers and the Abilene Braves to advance to the semifinals against the Clyde Aces. They beat Clyde in a nail-biter 6-5. That sent the team to the championship, where they beat Albany.
The Wylie Gray team also advanced to the semifinals by beating the Abilene Angels and the Northern Red Sox; however they fell to the Albany Lions.
The Wylie Black Team lost its first game to Clyde.
Intermediate
The Wylie Black and Wylie White teams advanced to the semifinals of the Intermediate Tournament, but fell short of setting up an all-Wylie final.
The Wylie Black team fell to Anson in the semis, and Wylie White fell to Snyder.
Wylie White got to the semis by beating the Abilene Wildcats and winning a nail-biter against the Wylie Purple 12-11.
Wylie Black got to the semis by beating Wylie Gray 8-7 in another nail-biter.
Majors
The Wylie Cubs beat the Wylie Pirates 6-3 in an all Wylie City Championship game to advance to the District Championship. The Cubs were a Cinderella team coming into the District Tournament. They finished 4th in the Wylie League, just barely qualifying for the tournament. But they played well, beating the Dixie Dodgers and then the Southern Reds to set up the city championship game against the Pirates, who finished 2nd in the Wylie league. The Pirates beat the Eastern Yankees and the Dixie Nationals, before losing to the Cubs in the City Championship.
The Wylie Angels (3rd in the Wylie league) and Wylie Cardinals (1st in the Wylie league) also qualified for the City Tournament and each won their first-round game. The Angels won 6-2 over Northern. The Cardinals beat the Dixie Indians 7-6. The Angels beat Eastern 9-2 in the second round, but lost to the Pirates in the third round. The Cardinals lost to the Dixie Cubs in the second round.
Minor
The Wylie Thunder advanced to the City Championship game, where they lost a heart breaker against the Dixie Storm Chasers 7-6.
The Thunder was ahead going into the final inning but couldn’t get those final three outs, and the Storm Chasers pulled off the comeback.
The Thunder, which won 1st place in the Wylie league, beat Dixie Fireflies, the Eastern Tigers and the Southern Bats to advance to the City Championship. The Wylie Hot Rods (2nd in the Wylie league) almost made it an all-Wylie City Championship, but they fell to the Storm Chasers 8-2 the night before. The Hot Rods started the tournament by beating the Dixie Chihuahuas and the Eastern Cowboys before falling to the eventual City Champs. The Storm Chasers had to beat three Wylie teams to win the City Championship. They beat the Wylie Marauders (4th in the Wylie league) in the first round before downing the Hot Rods and then the Thunder.
The Wylie Chihuahuas (3rd in the Wylie league) also qualified for the City Tournament but lost to Northern in the first round.