The 12U Disla Dukes won the Beat The Heat championship for their first tournament title.
By Rich Bevensee
The Doylestown Tigers have spent the spring and summer hammering opponents with a high-octane offense which has been difficult to match.
The Disla Dukes, playing in just their second tournament championship game all season, were up to the task. First-inning home runs by Robert Boettger and Logan Clough fueled a six-run outburst, and the Dukes never looked back.
Luke Pollak’s grand slam home run in the fourth was the game breaker, and the fourth-seeded Dukes rolled to a 12-6 victory over the third-seeded Tigers to claim the 12U Beat The Heat Powered By Farah Nutrition championship on Sunday at Diamond Nation in Flemington.
The Dukes (16-15-1), who hail from East Hanover, N.J., have won six of their last eight games to climb above .500 for the first time since April.
“We haven’t played in a championship game since we made a USABL final two months ago,” Dukes coach Andy Rodriguez said. “The way we started the game and kept it up, it says a lot about their character. I’m proud of those boys, man. I’m proud of those boys.”
Doylestown (Pa.) entered the final with a gaudy 26-7-1 record, thanks mostly to averaging 10 runs per-game. The Tigers, who have reached double figures in more than half of their games, scored 43 runs in the three Beat The Heat games leading into the final.
But it was the Dukes who stole the Tigers’ thunder. That thunder boomed suddenly in the top of the first inning. Joey Yancek walked and Boettger homered for a 2-0 lead. K.J. Forehner singled and Logan Clough homered for a 4-0 lead.
Marty O’Boyle doubled, Luke Pollak singled and Harrison Armenti ripped a two-run single for a 6-0 lead. And not one Duke had been retired yet.
“That first inning was so big for us because we had a lot of close games this weekend and that early lead was really important,” Pollak said. “The dugout was electric. It was crazy.”
“That was really big for us,” said O’Boyle, the tournament’s Most Valuable Player. “Coach always talks about momentum and we came out hot.”
O’Boyle went 2-for-4 with a double and two runs scored in the final. For the weekend, he batted .538 through four games with three homers, 10 RBI and seven runs scored.
The Dukes’ Marty O’Boyle batted .538 with three homers and 10 RBI to earn the tournament’s MVP.
“Offensively he carried the load this weekend,” Rodriguez said. “The kid’s been performing every day, every game, every weekend. He’s always in the lab, he’s reading pitchers. That kid works on hitting almost every single day. He takes no days off. Offensively he’s a machine.”
The Dukes’ first-inning uproar did not tame the Tigers, as their first four batters reached safely. Larry Scheetz had an RBI single, Greg Kneisel drove in a run with a groundout, and Jake Stephenson smacked a two-run homer to bring Doylestown within 6-4.
Stephenson’s homer was one of the longest of the year at Diamond Nation’s Field 2, as it completely cleared the blue batting cage roof behind the right field fence for a modestly estimated distance of 285 feet.
In the second, the Dukes added a run for a 7-4 advantage when Boettger singled and later scored from third while Tigers shortstop Shane Grosso turned a double play.
The Tigers made it a two-run game once more in the third on another Scheetz RBI single. Then Pollak took center stage.
The Dukes loaded the bases with two out in the fourth, and Pollak drove the first pitch he saw over the center field fence for a grand slam, his second homer of the weekend and fourth of the season, providing the Dukes with a more comfortable 11-5 lead.
“I had a single earlier in the game so I was already hyped up,” Pollak said. “I had bases loaded, tensions were high so I turned and burned.”
“That absolutely took the game over right there,” Rodriguez said. “That was the big blast that we needed.”
Pollak closed the team’s four-game weekend with a bang. After going hitless in his team’s first two games, Pollak went 4-for-7 with two homers, six RBI and four runs scored in two playoff games on Sunday. Disla routed the Massachusetts Captains, 13-3, in the semifinals.
Pollak also enjoyed a brilliant game in center field, making two catches while retreating toward the fence.
The Tigers added one more run in the fourth on a Greg Kneisel solo homer. The Dukes got that one back in the sixth when Pollak’s two-out single through the middle drove in Clough for the final score. Pollak finished 3-for-4 with five RBI.
The 12 runs scored in the championship game gave the Dukes 45 runs in four games, one of their most prolific four-game stretches all season.
“The first inning was great but I don’t think it mattered because I think they would have come out hot regardless,” Rodriguez said. “I speak to them before every game and tell them to make sure they’re ready mentally and physically every single day. Today they showed how good they can be.”
The Dukes defeated two difficult opponents in pool play, Diamond Jacks Super 12U, 8-7, and Morris County Cubs Navy, 12-7.
For the Dukes, Froehner went 3-for-4 with two runs scored, Armenti went 2-for-4 with a double and two RBI, and Clough was 2-for-2 with two RBI and was hit by pitches twice. Joey Yancek pitched five innings and Boettger closed with an inning of relief.
The Tigers routed 3 Up 3 Down, 10-7, and the Out Of The Park Cyclones Prospects, 15-2, in pool play. In the semis the Tigers dismissed Academy Baseball Red, 18-5.
For the Tigers, Scheetz was the team’s only player with multiple hits, going 3-for-3 with two RBI, and Mason Barlow and Jack Romano both doubled. Scheetz pitched to seven batters in the first inning, Romano threw four innings and Henry Kephart tossed the final two frames.