Hopewell 11-Year Olds Headed to Championship Game

HOPEWELL TWP-  The Hopewell 11-year olds are one win away from winning their home tournament.

This afternoon in a tightly contested game, the Vikings beat Central Valley, 6-4 in the semifinals of the 2024 Hopewell Tournament.

Hopewell takes on Washington in the championship game later tonight.

Pitching and timely hitting was the key tonight for Hopewell as Wade Enders, Rilynn Davis and Kruz Krotec allowed just 7 hits and struck out CV batters.

Trailing 1-0 in the second, the Vikings tied things up as Wes Gigliotti brought in Colby Cunningham on a grounder to first.

Enders went the first two innings, allowing 1 hit, 1 run while striking out 5 batters.

In the bottom of the 3rd with CV up 2-1, Brandon Cecchini ripped a double into left field scoring Elliott Mancos and Austin Gallagher. Hopewell led 3-2.

Davis pitched the 3rd and 4th innings and the 4th inning was key as Hopewell took the lead and she followed that by pitching a 1-2-3 frame. Two of the outs came on grounders back to the mound.

The Vikings added to their lead in the bottom of the 4th. Gigliotti led off with a single and came around to score on a Rhett Rankin double to center.

Later in the same inning, with 2 outs, Eli Seech had a great at-bat, fouling off pitches and eventually singled to bring in Rankin. The last run of the inning came as Krotec stole home. Hopewell led 6-2 after four.

Krotec pitched the 5th inning and set CV down 1-2-3 by striking out the side.

CV made it interesting in the final inning as they closed the deficit to 6-4 and had a runner on 2nd with 0 out. The CV batter flew out to medium center field and the runner attempted to advance to third. Bad idea as Cunningham threw a bullet to Rankin nailing the runner easily.

With 2 outs, the game ended on this play.