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(Story by Marco Stoovelaar)
 HCAW wins Urbanus Tournament and exhibition-season
Nederlands
 BUSSUM -
HCAW is the winner of the 40th edition of the annual In Memoriam Charles Urbanus, Sr. Tournament.
On Sunday (April 3), the Bussum-club and organisor of the event won 5-1 in the Final against Curaçao Neptunus.
Earlier on the day, Twins Oosterhout won 9-5 against L&D Amsterdam Pirates in a game that was halted after 6½ inning, due to hail and rain.
It marks the first time since 2018 and the tenth time overall that HCAW has won the tournament.
With today's results, the two finalists of last years Holland Series (Pirates and Neptunus) were both left empty-handed.
Due to the cold temperatures (and snow) in the recent days, the first two games of the tournament, scheduled for Thursday-evening, were also both cancelled.
The game between Amsterdam Pirates and HCAW, which was to be played in Amsterdam, was already cancelled on Wednesday-afternoon.
The game between Twins and Neptunus, to be played in Oosterhout, was cancelled on Thursday-afternoon.
Due to the cancellations on Thursday, the format of the tournament was changed.
The two games scheduled for Saturday became Semi-Finals with the winners advancing the the Final.
In 1981, it was Amsterdam-based Amstel Tijgers that introduced the tournament in remembrance of Charles Urbanus, Sr., who had passed away in 1980.
Urbanus had been a longtime coach of the Netherlands National Baseball Team, as well as OVVO from which Amstel Tijgers originated.
He was the brother of legendary National Team-pitcher Han Urbanus (who passed away last year) and the uncle of Charles Urbanus (Jr.).
In early 1989, Amstel Tijgers merged with HCAW, which then also took over the organization of the tournament and went on to play as HCAW-Tijgers for four seasons.
In 1990, the tournament was first played at the club's home-site in Bussum after the previous two tournaments had been played at the site of Haarlem Nicols.
Twice, the tournament was not played.
The first time, it was cancelled due to rain, the second time, it was cancelled when both Neptunus and Kinheim withdrew, as they faced each other in the European Super Cup in the same weekend.
Since the beginning, the three best teams of the previous season were invited to join host club Amstel Tijgers or HCAW.
With its two victories this weekend, HCAW also finished in first place in this years exhibition season.
The Bussum-team remained unbeaten in ten games.
HCAW won eight of them, while two ended with a tie.
Twins Oosterhout and Quick Amersfoort share second place.
The other two particpants in the tournament, L&D Amsterdam Pirates and Curaçao Neptunus finished in the 'cellar'.
Pirates finished seventh, Neptunus in eighth place.
Coming Thursday-evening (April 7), the regular season opens.
HCAW then meets Hoofddorp Pioniers (home on Thursday and Sunday, away in Hoofddorp on Saturday).
Neptunus opens against DSS/Kinheim (Thursday, Sunday home; Saturday in Haarlem).
Twins Oosterhout plays against Quick Amersfoort (also home on Thursday and Sunday; away on Saturday).
Amsterdam Pirates plays a 3-game series against RCH Memorie Sieraden (also playing twice at home on Thursday and Sunday and away on Saturday in Heemstede).
(April 3)
Final Standings:
1. HCAW, 2. Curaçao Neptunus, 3. Twins Oosterhout, 4. L&D Amsterdam Pirates.
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Game 5 - Twins Oosterhout vs. L&D Amsterdam Pirates (3rd/4th place)
Twins Oosterhout took an early lead and rallied for six runs in the fourth inning.
Trailing 7-0, L&D Amsterdam Pirates narrowed the deficit to 7-4 thanks to a rally in the top of the sixth, but Twins took some more distance.
Halfway the seventh inning, the game was halted due to hail and rain.
There were eleven basehits in this game, but there also were nineteen walks.
Twelve of these walks were issued by the two pitchers that took the mound for Amsterdam Pirates, which outhit Twins 7-4.
Twins got its first three batters on base in the top of the first inning off of Pirates-starter Connor Prins.
He gave up a lead-off single to Rayshelon Carolina, then walked Railison Bentura and Jarreau Martina.
An error followed and that enable Carolina to score the first run, before the next three batters were eliminated.
Prins recovered and retired the side in the second and third inning (four strikeouts).
But after having retired nine consecutive batters, he ran into problems in the fourth.
Arthur Bonevacia led off with a single and with one out, Twins got the bases loaded when Jason Halman also singled and Urving Kemp walked.
An then, Twins started a 6-run rally.
Bonevacia scored on a passed ball, the bases got loaded again via a walk for Mick Vos, Halman and Kemp then scored when an error was made on a grounder by Jerzy van Gool.
When the bases were re-loaded again after a walk for Carolina, Donny Breek took over the Pirates-pitching.
But Vos went on to score on a passed ball and both Van Gool and Carolina scored on a wild pitch.
Twins then got the bases loaded again when Bentura, Martina and Bonevacia all walked.
The long at bat finally ended when Shurman Marlin grounded into a double play.
Trailing 7-0, Pirates was able to come back in the sixth inning.
In its first four at bats, Pirates got on base each time off of starter Ryan Huntington, but was held scoreless.
With two outs in the first inning, Rashid Gerard singled and Roelie Henrique walked, but were left behind.
In the second inning, Huntington was supported with a double play and in both the third and fourth inning, Pirates stranded a runner on first base.
In the fifth inning, Ruben van de Koppel took over the pitching for Twins, which then turned another double play.
But the rookie then also ran into problems in the sixth.
Van de Koppel, who last season pitched in the First Division for Euro Stars, got the bases loaded via Luca Pastor (walk), Gerard (walk) and Henrique (single).
Newcomer Rachid Engelhardt (2-run), Delano Selassa (1-run) and Denzel Richardson (1-run) followed with runscoring singles that narrowed the deficit to 7-4.
Hereafter, the first out was recorded and that also brough in new pitcher Jeffrey Levenstone, who got two grounders.
Twins immediately got two runs back with two outs in the bottom of the sixth off of Breek.
With Carolina (walk) on first base and two outs, Martina walked.
Bonevacia then delivered a runscoring single, which led to runners on first and third base.
In a double-steal situation, Martina then scored from third base.
Pirates was able to score one more run in the seventh, while it had started to hail.
The bases got loaded when Levenstone walked Pastor, Gerard and Henrique.
Moments later, Pastor scored on a sacrifice fly by Engelhardt.
With two runners on base and one out, Pastor Enrique Martínez Chavez was inserted as new pitcher.
He began with a strikeout and then got a flyout.
That also ended the game, as it now had started to rain.
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| Twins Oosterhout - L&D Amsterdam Pirates 9-5 (6½ inn.) |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | | R | H | E |
| L&D Amsterdam Pirates | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 1 | | | - | 5 | 7 | 2 |
| Twins Oosterhout | 1 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 2 | X | | | - | 9 | 4 | 1 |
| pitchers Amsterdam Pirates | inn. | SO | BB | H | R | ER |
| Connor Prins, L | 3.1 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 7 | 5 |
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| Donny Breek | 2.2 | - | 7 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
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| pitchers Twins Oosterhout | inn. | SO | BB | H | R | ER |
| Ryan Huntington, W | 4 | 2 | 1 | 3 | - | - |
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| Ruben van de Koppel | 1.1 | - | 3 | 4 | 4 | 4 |
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| Jeffrey Levenstone, H | 1 | - | 3 | - | 1 | 1 |
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| Pastor Enrique Martínez Chavez, SV | 0.2 | 1 | - | - | - | - |
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Game 6 - HCAW vs. Curaçao Neptunus (Final)
The Final of the tournament started 29 minutes later than scheduled due to the rain that had ended the previous game between Twins Oosterhout and L&D Amsterdam Pirates halfway the seventh inning.
It was Neptunus that opened the score in the first inning.
That not only was to be the lone run scored by the Rotterdam-team, it also was one of only three times that the team got into scoring position.
HCAW turned the game around from the fourth inning on.
In the top of the first inning, Raydley Legito and newcomer Jiandido Tromp began for Neptunus with a single off of HCAW-starter Dennis Burgersdijk.
A pop-fly by John Polonius then became an infield-fly.
Hereafter, Tromp was forced out at second base on a grounder towards first base by Roger Bernardina, which brought Legito to third base.
After Tromp was forced out, short stop Bob van der Meer threw the ball to first base to complete a double play.
However, there, Burgersdijk had taken over, but missed the throw, which enabled Legito to score.
In his next four innings on the mound, Burgersdijk would allow only one more batter to reach base.
After having retired eight batters in a row, the righthander gave up an one-out single to Bernadina in the fourth inning.
He moved on a grounder, but stranded on second base.
HCAW got into scoring position for the first time in the bottom of the third inning off of Neptunus-starter Kaj Timmermans.
With one out, Nathan Berkel singled and stole second base, then Jair van Borkulo reached on an infield-hit.
Hereafter, Berkel was forced out and two runners were left behind.
HCAW then scored twice with two outs in the bottom of the fourth inning.
After the first two batters were eliminated, Max Draijer and Bob van der Meer singled.
Jules Cremer then also singled to bring in Draijer and when that was followed by an outfield-error, Van der Meer also was able to score.
Cremer ended up on third base, then could not advance on an infield-hit by Berkel, who later again stole second base.
They were left behind.
HCAW added a run in the sixth inning off of Misja Harcksen, who had taken over the pitching in the previous at bat.
Again with two outs, after the Neptunus-defense had turned a double play.
Cremer then walked, stole second base and scored on a following single by Berkel (who was 3-for-4).
On the throw to the plate (plus an error), Berkel was able to reach third base, but was left behind.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, HCAW took more distance by scoring two unearned runs off of new pitcher Kevin Bakker.
And the runs were again scored with two outs.
Kevin Dirksen then reached on an error and Jeandro Tromp walked.
They advanced on a wild pitch, then both scored on a triple by Max Draijer to increase the lead to 5-1.
Neptunus was unable to reach base in the fifth through eighth inning.
After being retired in order by Burgersdijk in the fifth, Gio de Graauw retired six batters in the next two innings and Jasper Elfrink retired the side in the eighth.
In the top of the ninth, Neptunus got three baserunners off of rookie Stijn van der Schaaf.
With two outs, John Polonius singled to become only the fifth runner for Neptunus.
Next batter Roger Bernadina walked.
Hereafter, the latter was forced out on a grounder by Dwayne Kemp, which ended the game.
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| HCAW - Curaçao Neptunus 5-1 |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | | R | H | E |
| Curaçao Neptunus | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | - | 1 | 4 | 3 |
| HCAW | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | X | - | 5 | 9 | 1 |
| pitchers Neptunus | inn. | SO | BB | H | R | ER |
| Kaj Timmermans, L | 4 | 3 | 1 | 6 | 2 | 1 |
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| Misja Harcksen | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
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| Kevin Bakker | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | - |
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| pitchers HCAW | inn. | SO | BB | H | R | ER |
| Dennis Burgersdijk, W | 5 | 3 | - | 3 | 1 | - |
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| Gio de Graauw, H | 2 | - | - | - | - | - |
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| Jasper Elfrink | 1 | - | - | - | - | - |
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| Stijn van der Schaaf | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | - | - |
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Umpires: HP-Niek Elshof, 1B-Ric Zwanenberg.
Official Scorer-Rob Schuurman.
Public Address Announcer-Huub Baaij.
Scoreboard Operator-Nico van de Luitgaren.
Starting Time-3:29 PM.
Time Played-2:19 hrs.
Site-Rob Hoffmann Vallei, Sportpark Zanderijweg, Bussum.
Game Notes:
 Exhibition game.
Game 6 In Memoriam Charles Urbanus, Sr. Tournament 2022 (Final). |
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Copyright © 1997-2022 Marco Stoovelaar / Grand Slam * Stats & News.
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