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In only its third year, the Team 1 Elite Club Invite has become a top stop for elite club teams in the heartland and last weekend’s 64-team tournament was a successful preliminary to the Team 1 Championship that will take place July 9-12.
‘The event really emphasized the quality of teams and games over the quantity of them,” Co-Founder Greg Dickel of Iowa Premier explained.
The Club Invite, which took place in the Kansas City area from June 11-14, also was unique in that it kicked off the Heart of America Fastpitch League games with several league teams in the event.
“The league format creates a competitive aspect for all pool games; each game means something,” Ryan Taylor, head of the Aces Fastpitch organization and also a Co-Found of Team 1 stressed. “Teams had the ability to play multiple pool games into bracket and—as it’s important to focus on getting better this summer–the bracket games challenge players.”
The quality of the participating teams was high, as shown by the fact that in the quarterfinal matchups in the 18U Premier Division all the teams battling on Sunday were either in the Top 50 of the Extra Elite Eighty Club Rankings and/or the U.S. Club Rankings.
Dickel added that the level of umpire play was “outstanding and led by NPF Umpire of the Year Scott Mair. It further promoted the high level of play having college umpires working most of the games.”
Here’s a look at the three age divisions championship which were held in the Premier (winner’s bracket) and the Platinum (loser’s bracket) levels…
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TEAM 1 ELITE CLUB INVITE – PREMIER CHAMPIONSHIPS
* 18U Premier Championship: Oklahoma Athletics – Yeatts 4, DeMarini Aces – Taylor 2
The A’s, coached by JC Yeatts, doubled up the Aces despite the fact that they had lost 10-0 earlier in pool play. Taylor’s Aces team jumped out to a 2-0 lead, but the Athletics scored four unanswered runs for the win.
It didn’t come easily though, as the powerful Aces offense twice left the bases loaded. Making the win even more impressive: the Oklahoma team is a 16U squad and ran the table in 18U.
Lead the way for Yeatts and Assistant Coach Lance West were standout 2022 pitchers SJ Geurin (Oklahoma commit) and Ashanti McDade (uncommitted) who West said were “lights out in the circle.”
“Playing up in the 18U division you know that you will be facing girls that are bigger, faster, and stronger than you,” the coach continued. “We knew that we would have to do the little things right, pitch well, and have some timely hitting to be successful in the tournament. The strength of our team is pitching and defense, and they did not disappoint.”
The A’s pitchers combined for a 1.13 ERA, striking out 62 in the tournament, while only walking 12 in eight games.
The defense also rose to the challenge and posted a .960 fielding percentage while the offense came through with seven home runs in the eight contests.
“It seemed that every one of them came at a time when we needed a spark or to put the game away,” West said. “We’re very proud of the way our team competed. There were many times when we were down early and the ladies refused to lose. It was a total team effort.”
For the host Aces Fastpitch 18U team, it was a case of what could have been. One of the strongest and deepest 18U teams in the nation, Taylor’s squad hit four home runs in the semi’s to beat another good Oklahoma A’s 18U team, this one coached by Brian Madden, 9-6 to make the title game.
Taylor felt the pool play big win (10-0) over A’s-Madden didn’t matter when it came time for the championship game to start.
“It’s always hard to turn that around,” he began, “but we got out to an early lead. We struggled a little this weekend giving the lead back to teams although hitting 15 home runs over eight games cleans up a lot of issues.”
Her lamented the fact that the Aces left nine runners on base in the loss and completed the victors saying, “Great job to the Yeatts team on winning, we just couldn’t pull together the big hit when we needed it.”
Still, there was a lot to build on, especially offensively.
“Outfielder Ashton Maloney (2021, Texas) hit .708 on the week and she and Avery Hobson (2021 outfielder, Oklahoma State) really set the tone for our offense. Kara Daly (2021 infielder, Mizzou) and Kacie Hoffmann (2021 outfielder, Arkansas) absolutely launched the ball all weekend. I’m really proud of how we hit the ball throughout the tournament.”
* 16U Premier Championship: DeMarini Aces Black 9, Original KC 0
Taylor may have lost the 18U final, but his 16U team showed it’s a force to deal with in other events this summer as the Aces Black went 7-1 for the week and featured timely hitting and great pitching.
The team came out to play on Sunday and dominated the competition, scoring 24 runs and only giving up three in the trio of victories on championship day.
The coach explained: “Our pitchers, Cierra Harrison (2022) and Katie Brooks (2021, Kansas commit) handled the competition well and at the plate Rylee Boone (2022 infielder), Alivia Beard (2022 outfielder) and Sam Bertoncino (2021 infielder) led the charge.”
* 14U Premier Championship: Iowa Premier National 3, Iowa Premier – Babb 2
In the 14U title win you’d be safe in predicting an Iowa Premier win because, for the second time this season, the two talented 14U teams for Greg Dickel’s organization faced each other.
And, like the first time when the National team pulled off a one-run victory (1-0 in seven innings), this one went down to the wire as well, going into the eighth inning before Ashley Wolfe, a 2023 Extra Elite 100 middle infielder, hit a walk-off game-winning single.
The Iowa Premier National team was paced by Teagan Kavan, a 6-foot power pitcher, who had earlier this year led the team to a 14U title at the Top Club Spring Invite (May 31, 2020) when she struck out 16.
The champs went 8-0 on the week and the pitching never game up more than two runs in any game—just seven total including four shutouts—while the offensive scored in double digits in five of the wins, impressively racking up 10, 10, 14, 15 and 15 runs.
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TEAM 1 ELITE CLUB INVITE – PLATINUM CHAMPIONSHIPS
- 18U Platinum Championship: St. Louis Chaos – Beatty 6, Premier FP 2
- 16U Platinum Championship: Iowa Premier Gold 7, St. Louis Chaos – Beatty 0
- 14U Platinum Championship: St. Louis Chaos – Alvarado 9, Texas Glory 05 8
Evan Beatty, whose St. Louis Chaos teams won two of the three Platinum titles, said dropping to the loser’s bracket but winning from there will benefit his teams for the rest of the summer.
“We would have rather stayed in the winner’s bracket,” he admitted, “but I love the way my 14s, 16s and 18s set that disappointment aside and fought hard through the platinum bracket to make it to the final in all three age divisions with 14s and 16s winning the Platinum championships.”
The coach hopes the Team 1 Elite Club Invite march to the title games will give his program some momentum heading into the rest of the summer starting with the Top Club Invite in two weeks and later the Heart of America Championship in August.
“I know—along with all teams—we’re off to a slow start because of the inability to play or practice (due to the COVID-19 pandemic), but we’ve been able to get some games in lately and as the weekend went on we started to make some real progress where we want to be.”
“All three teams were hitting better by and through Sunday which I am sure is related to getting their timing down and seeing that level of pitching for two weekends straight. I look at this weekend as the first step toward our season’s goals are definitely higher for this group. I just think this group is starting to buy in and learning to play the game the right way.”
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Team 1 Elite Club Invite Score Links
- Click HERE for all 18U Scores & Results
- Click HERE for all 16U Scores & Results
- Click HERE for all 14U Scores & Results