Dodgers Win Avon Lake Youth Baseball Federation Minor Division

The Minor Division of the Avon Lake Youth Baseball Federation had its Championship game this past week, and it was everything you could ask for in a championship game.

In the end, the Dodgers, coached by Mike Kovacs, upset the Tigers to take home the crown. The Tigers held a 4-2 lead in the fourth inning, but scored two runs to tie things up. The Tigers then took a one run lead into the sixth inning, but that's when the Dodgers came up big.

Kyle Blazina hit a triple off the left field fence to clear the bases and give the Dodgers an 8-5 lead.

The Tigers seemed poised to make a game of things in the last half of the inning, but the Dodgers defense proved to be too much. Chris Skelly made the first out with a nice diving play and a shot to first, and then Stephen Kovacs made a nice backhand play at first and tagged the runner out. While the Tigers  did eventually put some runners on base, Griff Urbin made the final out with yet another nice fielding play and a tagged out of the runner heading to third.

Skelly had a couple of nice hits in the game to help the Dodgers cause, as did Stephen Kovacs, who had a single and scored a couple of runs.

The Dodgers finished the year with a 14-5 slate.

"I'm really proud of the kids, because at the beginning of the year we started 2-4," Mike Kovacs said. "We were missing cutoffs, and they just turned it on. Once they got one win, and then another to put them at 500 they gained more and more confidence and they started winning ball games."

The Dodgers were also helped to the championship by Dillon Aslaksen, who did an outstanding job behind the plate in his first year, and another first year player in CJ Brausch, who was also consistent throughout the season. But Kovacs said the path to the championship was paved by a total team effort.

 "It was a different kid stepping up every night to help the team win." Kovacs said.

The Dodgers are:

Chris Skelly          10
Stephen Kovacs     4
Kyle Blazina          12
CJ  Brausch           9
Griffin Urban           2
Charles Cindric       1
Brett Parks           7
Dillon Aslaksen      14
Conner Bourgeault     3
Cody Gasner           5
Derek Stepak         6
Gabe Zajac          13