The 79th AAABA Tournament ended with a historic 1-0, 15-inning classic as the Columbus TNT Knights edged the Buffalo East Coast Orville’s for the franchise’s first tournament title.
The award winners honored on the field after the game included:
• Co-Most Valuable Player award winners Jackson Judy of Columbus and Joey Haynes of Buffalo. Judy started two games and went 1-0 with a 0.64 earned run average in 11 innings. He struck out 10 and walked four. Haynes went 11-for-22 with a .500 batting average, two triples, four RBIs and eight runs for the tournament runner-up.
• Brooklyn’s Nicholas Nunez won the tournament batting title with a .615 average (8-for-13).
• The tournament strikeout leader was Butler’s Brian Pirone with 16 Ks in 12 innings pitched
• New Orleans third baseman Rhett Centanni took the tournament RBI crown by driving in 11 runs for the 3-1 Boosters. Centanni had three home runs and two doubles.
• First-year AAABA Tournament franchise Butler Blue Sox took the Sportsmanship Award. Butler won its first two tournament games against Altoona-2 (13-9) and New York City (4-1) before falling to New Orleans (2-0) and Columbus (6-2).
• Johnstown-2 Mainline Pharmacy shortstop Josh Ulery repeated as The Tribune-Democrat local franchise tournament MVP. Ulery batted .474 (9-for-19) with two doubles, five runs and two RBIs. He had a .967 fielding percentage with nine put outs and one error. He was part of five double plays for 3-2 Mainline Pharmacy.