(Story by Marco Stoovelaar)
 HCAW opens exhibition season coming weekend
Nederlands
IN MEMORIAM 
...Gerard Aerts...
(1952 - 2015)
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  BUSSUM / OOSTERHOUT (Neth.) -
HCAW will be the first big league-team to get into action during this years exhibition season.
The team from Bussum will open its preparations for the coming big league-season next Sunday with a game at Twins in Oosterhout, starting at 2:30 PM.
Initially, both teams also were scheduled to meet each other on Saturday in Bussum.
However, that game was cancelled due to a sad reason.
On Sunday, March 1, Gerard Aerts, the trainer of the baseball-team, unexpectedly passed away at the age of 62.
The memorial service for Gerard Aerts, nicknamed 'Big G', will be held on Saturday in Breda.
On Sunday, HCAW's new Head Coach Ralph Milliard will meet his former team, as he was the Head Coach of Twins last season.
With Twins, he finished in second place in the second hightest league ('Overgangsklasse') after losing the final game of the season to DSS, which ended up first place and later promoted to the big league.
The exhibition season really gets underway in the weekend of March 14-15, as all eight big league-teams then will have games scheduled.
Reigning Dutch champion Curaçao Neptunus meets Twins, Saturday at home and Sunday in Oosterhout.
L&D Amsterdam Pirates, which last year failed to hold onto a 3-1 lead in the best-of-seven Holland Series and ended up empty-handed, meets Vaessen Pioniers, which also had qualified for the Play-Offs last season.
The teams first play in Hoofddorp, then meet in Amsterdam on Sunday.
Corendon Kinheim, the fourth team to reach the Play-Offs in 2014, meets DSS, which will make its debut in the big league this year.
The two clubs are neighbours at the Pim Mulier Sports Complex in Haarlem.
On Saturday, they meet in the Pim Mulier Stadium, on Sunday, they will play on the neightbouring site of DSS the next day.
HCAW will continue its exhibition season against UVV, first playing at home, then in Vleuten the next day.
Mampaey The Hawks, which in January returned to the big league to take the vacant spot left by the withdrawal of ADO Lakers, plays its first game on Sunday, March 15.
On that day, the team will play at home in Dordrecht against Borgerhout Squirrels from Belgium.
Included in the exhibition season, there are six tournaments scheduled in which big league-teams are participating.
On March 28-29, the annual MJFP Van de Vegte Memorial will be held again at the site of De Hazenkamp in Nijmegen, while DSS will be one of four Haarlem-area based teams participating in the Haarlem Series at the site of Onze Gezellen.
On April 3-5, HCAW organizes its annual In Memoriam Charles Urbanus Sr. Tournament, while in Enschede, Tex Town Tigers is hosting its annual JCJ Mastenbroek Tournament on April 4 and 5.
Also in that weekend, there wil be a tournament at the site of RCH-Pinguïns in Heemstede, which initially had no big league-participant.
But Mampaey The Hawks is one of the participating teams, which now is back in the highest division.
On April 11 and 12, L&D Amsterdam Pirates organizes its second edition of the Loek Loevendie Tournament, which includes three of the four Play-Off teams of last season.
The exhibition season ends on Sunday, April 12.
On Thursday-evening, April 16, the regular season opens with four games.
(March 5)
Complete Schedule Exhibition Season
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