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(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by Monique Valies, Pepijn Beerman & Templiers Sénart) Templiers Sénart wins thrilling Final Loek Loevendie Indoor Tournament Nederlands AMSTERDAM (Neth.) - Templiers Sénart from France has won the seventh edition of the Big Uncle Loek International Indoor Under-12 Baseball Tournament, which was organized on Saturday-Sunday, January 7-8 by Amsterdam Pirates at its indoor-facility on its home-site at the Loek Loevendie Ballpark. In a thrilling Hitchockian Final, the French team won 12-10 against Mokum Giants in a game that lasted two hours and 42 minutes and needed three extra innings (including one with the international tie-break rule) to come to a decision. ...Tournament Directors Byron Ward (left) and... ...Pepijn Beerman with Uncle Loek Loevendie during... ...the 2019 tournament; This year, Beerman headed the... ...organizing committee, as Ward moved... ...to Curaçao a few years ago... (© Photo: Pepijn Beerman) The first six editions were held annually around Christmas in 2014-2019. The tournament was cancelled in 2020 and 2021 due to the measures against the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19). Initially, it was planned to organize the seventh tournament in the Christmas-holiday last year, but due to the availability of the indoor facility, it was decided to move the event to the first weekend of the new year, making it a New Year's Tournament, instead of a Christmas Tournament. As of now, the first weekend of January almost surely will be the new dates for the tournament from now. From the beginning, the driving forces behind the tournament in the first six editions are Pepijn Beerman, Byron Ward, Evelien Bode and Monique Valies. Ward and Beerman served as Tournament Directors. A few years ago, Ward moved to Curaçao with his family and so, Beerman now is the lone Tournament Director, but he is supported by an enthoustiac staff and members of the Organizing Committee. The tournament is named after 'Uncle' Loek Loevendie, who was one of the founders of Amsterdam Pirates (under the name of Rap) in 1959. Since then, he always has worked with youth-teams, most of them in the Under-12 age-category. Regularly, these teams captured regional or national titles, or won (international) tournaments. In his long coaching-career of 65 years, many of Loevendie's youth-players reached the main-team of the club, went on to play in the Dutch big league and some even played professionally in the USA. One of them was Rikkert Faneyte, who played in the Major League for San Francisco Giants and Texas Rangers. In all editions of the tournament, Faneyte has been a contributor to the tournament, as he is the pitcher during the Homerun Derby, which is always held on the first day of the tournament. And so, on Saturday, Faneyte was back in uniform again to throw the pitches to the six participating players, one for each team. Unfortunately, Loek Loevendie (Mr. Pirates) passed away on February 6, 2021 at age 88. That meant that this was the first tournament in which 'Uncle Loek' was not present himself, but his legacy was honored during the event and Amsterdam Pirates wil continue to do so in the future with this annual tournament. (January 10)

Just as in the previous tournaments, six teams participated, this time coming from Belgium, France, the USA and host Netherlands. They were divided into two Pools of three teams. On the first day, all teams played two games and the ranking then decided who would face who in Sunday's Final Round. On Saturday, Templiers Sénart from France won twice in Pool A to finish in first place, as did Mokum Giants in Pool B to qualify for the Final. Brasschaat Braves from Belgium and the American team of ABF finished in second place and would play for third and fourth place. Pirates All Stars and Drachten Diamonds played for fifth and sixth place on Sunday. 5th / 6th Place: On Sunday, Pirates All Stars finished in fifth place by winning 6-4 against Drachten Diamonds, which comes fromt the northen Dutch province of Friesland and participated for the first time. It was Drachten that opened the score in the top of the first inning. Lead-off hitter Lars Cuijpers was hit by a pitch and later scored on an error. Pirates answered with three runs in its first at bat. Dyshaia Zandvliet led off with an infield-hit and went on to score the first run on a wild pitch. With one out, Rafi Schoumacher walked and scored on a single by Jerinyo Calliste, who then scored himself on a grounder by Danny Vliegenthart. The Friesian team narrowed the deficit to 3-2 in the second at bat. Tichan Hoekstra then was hit by a pitch with one out and scored on a wild pitch with two outs. In the third inning, Drachten came alongside. Jochem Stellingwerf led off with a walk and scored the tying run on a wild pitch. Again, Pirates rallied for three runs to take the lead for the second time. Jerinyo Calliste led off with a single and Danny Vliegenthart walked. With one out and after a pitching change, they scored when Jan Kruijmer hit a homerun. Drachten was able to score one more run in the top of the fourth. Lennert Bijker then reached on a single and scored on a grounder by Merlijn de Rijker. 3rd / 4th Place: In the game for the Bronze Medal, Brasschaat Braves outscored ABF 7-4 to finish in third place. After a scoreless first inning, ABF got runners on second and third base in the second inning, but the Belgian pitching then struckout the next three batters. Brasschaat rallied for five runs in its second at bat off of two pitchers. The Belgian team got the bases loaded with no outs, then Louis Raymaekers delivered a runscoring single. With one out, a wild pitch accounted for the second run, then Maxime De Brauwer followed with a 2-run single and later scored herself on a wild pitch. ABF got four runs back in the top of the third inning, which were all scored on some throwing errors. However, this run-production made it a 5-4 score and brought back the suspense. In the bottom of the third inning, Brasschaat decided the game by scoring two runs. Lars Vandeneijnden (hit by pitch) and Milan Rediers (single) then respectively scored on a passed ball and a wild pitch. This time, ABF was unable to come back.

Final The Final between Templiers Sénart and Mokum Giants became a memorable game, full of suspension with several nice defensive plays, two homeruns and some solid pitching. It set the all-time tournament-record for innings played, as well as time played, as it took two hours and 42 minutes to come to a decision. Templiers Sénart was outhit 9-2 by Mokum Giants. Six Mokum-pitchers combined on sixteen strikeouts, but also walked fifteen French batters. Four Sénart-pitchers walked only six batters and struckout thirteen. Initially, Templiers led 5-1 halfway the second at bat, but after completion of the second inning, it was Mokum Giants that led 7-5, but the French opponent came alongside to force extra innings. When two extra innings led to a new tie score, an additional tie-break inning was played. This time, Templiers rallied for four runs in the seventh inning to take a decisive lead. Templiers opened the score with three runs in the top of the first inning. With one out, Lucas Sigal was hit by a pitch and Liam Hanrot walked. With two outs, Danny Canales belted a 3-run homerun. This remained the lone French basehit until the seventh inning. Mokum scored once in its first at bat on a wild pitch. ...Members of the Organizing Committee with... ...Official Scorer/Tournament Statistician Marco Stoovelaar... ...(3rd from right, back row) and Public Address... ...Announcer Hans Jansen de Vries (standing at right)... (© Photo: Monique Valies) In the second inning, Templiers added two runs, which were both scored on errors. Mokum Giants, which was one of the two teams that represented host Amsterdam Pirates, then rallied for six runs in the bottom of the second inning to take a 7-5 lead. With Charlie MacLure (hit by pitch) on base and one out and after a pitching change, Bruce van Deudekom walked. Berend van Strien and Kyrano Tevreden followed with runscoring singles. Mokum then erased the deficit when Imran Aouariaghel hit the ball into centerfield for a 3-run homerun. Now leading 6-5, the team added another run when Megan McGonagle singled and scored on a 2-out single by Marouan El Bouazzati. In the third inning, Templiers got a run back when Danny Canales walked with one out and scored on a wild pitch. In the next at bat, the French team came alongside. This time, Ethan Doyen led off with a walk and scored the tying run on an error. Mokum Giants was unable to come back, as Malcolm Saugère, the third French pitcher in this game, had a strong outing and threw 3 2/3 scoreless innings, striking out six batters. As the 75 minutes game-time had been reached and with the score tied, the game went into extra innings after the fourth at bat. After a scoreless fifth inning, Templiers re-took the lead in the sixth when Killian Miller was hit by a pitch and scored on a basesloaded walk by Danny Canales. With two outs, the team from Sénart had the bases loaded, but was unable to add some runs, as the inning ended with a nice play from pitcher , who fielded a comeback-grounder and tagged out the runner from third base just before home plate. But the 8-7 lead proved to be not enough, as Mokum Giants came alongside in its sixth at bat. With one out, Charlie MacLure singled and scored on a 2-out single by Bruce van Deudekom. With the latter on second base, reliever Malcolm Saugère struckout his eighth batter. Afterwards, he was named Most Valuable Player of the tournament. In the third extra inning, the international tie-break rule came into effect, meaning the at bat started with a runner on second base (the last batter of the previous at bat). In the top of the seventh, Templiers rallied for four runs to take a more comfortable lead. With one out, the team got the bases loaded, then an error led to the first run and a walk for Lucas Sigal accounted for the next run. Due to the pitchcount-rule, several pitching changes were made by both teams. With the bases still loaded, a sixth pitcher was inserted by Mokum. He began with a strikeout, but then gave up a 2-run single to Noé Davy, which made it a 12-8 score. This was only the second basehit for Templiers and the first since the first inning. But the game wasn't over yet. The home-team also got the bases loaded, however, with no outs. An infield-hit by Megan McGonagle then led to a run and with two outs, a walk for Luce MacLean made it a 12-10 score. But with the bases loaded, reliever Danny Canales (the fourth French pitcher) closed the game with a strikeout! And that ended the longest game in tournament-history.

Mokum Giants - Templiers Sénart 10-12 (7 inn.) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 R H E Templiers Sénart 3 2 1 1 0 1 4 - 12 2 1 Mokum Giants 1 6 0 0 0 1 2 - 10 9 4 pitchers Templiers Sénart inn. SO BB H R ER Noé Davy 1.1 3 1 - 2 2 Liam Hanrot - (*) - 1 4 5 5 Malcolm Saugère, W (1-0) 4.2 8 1 4 1 - Danny Canales 1 2 3 1 2 1 (*) - Hanrot pitched to five batters in the second inning pitchers Mokum Giants inn. SO BB H R ER Bruce van Deudekom 2 5 4 1 5 3 Marouan El Bouazzati 1 1 1 - 1 1 Imran Aouariaghel 2 6 4 - 1 - Berend van Strien 0.1 1 2 - 1 1 Jaythan Evertsz, L (0-1) 1 2 4 - 4 - Kyrano Tevreden 0.2 1 - 1 - - Homeruns: Templiers Sénart: Danny Canales (1)(1st,3-run,2 outs,off Van Deudekom); Mokum Giants: Imran Aouariaghel (1)(2nd,3-run,1 out,off Hanrot). Umpires: HP-René Veen, 1B-Roy van de Wateringen, 3B-Jeroen Rekveld. Official Scorers-Muriel van de Wateringen, Marco Stoovelaar. Umpire Commissioner-Piet Sterk. Public Address Announcer-Hans Jansen de Vries. Starting time-2:10 PM. Time Played-2:42 hrs. Site-Indoor-facility Loek Loevendie Ballpark, Sportpark Ookmeer, Amsterdam (Netherlands). Game Notes: Final 7th Big Uncle Loek International Indoor Under-12 Baseball Tournament.

Scores First Round on Saturday Pool A: Templiers Sénart vs. Pirates All Stars 12-1; Brasschaat Braves vs. Pirates All Stars 4-1; Templiers Sénart vs. Brasschaat Braves 3-0. Pool B: Mokum Giants vs. ABF 10-3; Drachten Diamonds vs. Mokum Giants 7-13; ABF vs. Drachten Diamonds 5-4. Scores Final Round on Sunday 5th/6th Place: Pirates All Stars vs. Drachten Diamonds 6-4. 3rd/4th Place: Brasschaat Braves vs. ABF 7-4. Final: Mokum Giants vs. Templiers Sénart 10-12 (7 inn.). Just as in the previous tournaments, all games on the first day were led by two umpires and in the final games on the second day by three umpires. Again, several umpires and official scorers participated, including some from the Dutch big league. Most of them also participated in earlier editions. This years Umpires were Fred ter Beek, Leo Markies, Jeroen Rekveld, René Veen, Kees van Vegten and Roy van de Wateringen, who were again led by Umpire Commissioner Piet Sterk. Marco Stoovelaar was present again as the Official Scorer and Tournament-Statistician. He was accompanied by Official Scorer Muriel van de Wateringen on Day Two. As always, Hans Jansen de Vries was the Public Address Announcer for all games.

Individual Awards Team MVP ABF Jayden Parsons ...The players and coaches of Templiers Sénart... ...celebrate winning the tournament... (© Photo: Templiers Sénart) Team MVP Brasschaat Braves Milan Rediers Team MVP Drachten Diamonds Lennert Bijker Team MVP Mokum Giants Charlie MacLure Team MVP Pirates All Stars Rafi Schoumacher Team MVP Templiers Sénart Noé Davy Best Hitter Bruce van Deudekom (Mokum Giants) Best Pitcher Mil De Quint (Brasschaat Braves Homerun King (1) Lars Vandeneijnde (Brasschaat Braves) King of the Diamond (2) Malcolm Saugère (Templiers Sénart) Speedy Gonzales Award Marouan El Bouazzati (Mokum Giants) Most Valuable Player Malcolm Saugère (Templiers Sénart) (1) - Winner of Homerun-derby on Day One (2) - Winner of King of the Diamond-competition on Day Two ...The team-trophies and individual awards of the tournament... (© Photo: Monique Valies)

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