Friday, June 20, 2008
By Jon Moffett
More than 200 teams took part last year and that many are expected this year.
BOARDMAN — The Mahoning Valley will garner national attention next month when Mahoning and Trumbull counties will host the 2008 PONY League fastpitch National Tournament.
“This area has always been known for its baseball and softball activities,” Boardman Community Baseball league president Tim Kaple said Thursday. “We are starting to be recognized as an area where people want to come to just have fun at economical prices.
“It’s just not about playing ball,” Kaple said. “The people here in our community are friendly. People enjoy going to the restaurants; the hotels are nice. It’s a great place for people to spend a week of their summer if it’s a week tournament or a weekend tournament. It’s just a great place to come.”
This summer’s tournament will be the second consecutive one co-sponsored by Thunder Elite Fast Pitch and Boardman Community Baseball. Previously, the tournament had been at the ThunderPlex in Vienna.
“We hope this will be a tremendous boost to our local economy,” said Rob Durig, Thunder Elite president and PONY tournament director.
Officials from the Mahoning County Convention & Visitors Bureau and the Trumbull County Tourism Bureau say that last year’s tournament garnered nearly $12 million in revenue for area businesses while bringing in approximately 15,000 visitors.
Four age groups will be taking part in the tournament. The 10-and-under, 12-and-under, 16-and-under and 18-and-under divisions will have their championship tournaments at one of five locations.
Teams participating in the tournament come from three foreign countries (Canada, Russia and the Czech Republic) and 14 states.
The 10U and 12U age groups will play at the Fields of Dreams in Boardman, McCune Park in Canfield, Liberty Township Park and the Optimist Club of Bazetta’s Candlelite Knolls fields.
The 16U and 18U age groups will play at those locations as well as Perkins Park in Warren.
More than 55 teams that have qualified in the 10U and 12U divisions. One-hundred-five teams have qualified for the 16U and 18U divisions.
Kaple said that many more teams are expected to qualify before the tournament.
“I’m hoping that the Valley will realize a similar number,” Kaple said, referring to the 240 teams that played in 2007. “We all know gas prices are what they are and things might be a little different this year, but we’re still very optimistic.
“Our registration is, so far, about on par with where we were last year at this time,” Kaple said. “We still have a month to go before we start, so we’re hopeful we’ll be in the same range.”
Kaple added that in order to compensate for the amount of teams, the tournament needed to branch out, which means the event has a better chance of returning to the Valley in the future.
“As this tournament continues to get better, we’re going to need more and more of those sites,” Kaple said. “You realize a complex only has so many fields to play and PONY wants sites where the community fields are fairly close together so there’s not a lot of travel between games. So we will be reaching out to other communities and trying to make it beneficial for a lot more sites in the future.”
The tournament will begin on July 19, with the 10U and 12U divisions playing plus an opening ceremony.
The 16U and 18U divisions will begin playing following their opening ceremony on July 26.
The opening ceremonies will begin at 9 a.m. at Eastwood Field in Niles.
“It is competitive,” Kaple said. “If you come to watch these girls play, they mean business.
“A lot of them travel a long way and they want to go home the winner. They are here to win the softball tournament; that is what they come for,” Kaple said. “But it is fun. You see them trading pins and sharing experiences among team who have never met each other before. There is a lot of camaraderie built over this entire event.”