Dover 12s ready for second shot at a Cal Ripken World Series championship
DOVER — Fifteen players, six coaches, and a traveling party of nearly 30 more were set to board a JetBlue flight early Wednesday morning at Boston’s Logan Airport.
The destination for the Dover Cal Ripken 12-year-old all-star team and its fan base was Kansas City, Missouri. Then, the Dover contingent was scheduled to pick up their respective rental cars and embark on a three-hour, 211-mile drive southeast to Branson for the Cal Ripken 12-year-old World Series.
“The kids are excited, they’re ready to go,” Dover head coach Mike Lynch said. “It’s been a different summer for us. Each year we had to fight and win every game to get where we wanted to go. These kids have known all along this (tournament) is the cherry on top of the sundae of their 12-year-old season. Everything has been working towards this. It’s crazy that it’s finally here. We’re all excited and ready.”
How Dover qualified for this year's Cal Ripken 12-year-old World Series
Dover defeated West Hartford, Connecticut in last summer’s New England championship. With no World Series at the 11-year-old level, regional winners in 2022 qualified for the 12-year-old 2023 World Series.
Dover played in the Cal Ripken 10-year-old World Series in 2021, advancing to the Round of 12 of the 20-team tournament in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
“The kids are nervous, too,” Lynch said. “They know they’re going against 34 of the best teams in the United States and the world who are there.”
Dover won the Cal Ripken state championship at the 8-, 9-, and 11-year-old level. There was no tournament in 2020 when this team was 10. Dover lost to Nashua in this year’s 12-year-old state championship game.
More: Dover 12s six-game win streak comes up short in Cal Ripken state final against Nashua
How the 2023 Cal Ripken World Series works
There are four six-pool teams in 24-team United States field. Each team plays five games, one each against the other teams in their pool. The top two teams from each pool advance to the single-elimination championship round.
The winner of the United States bracket faces the International bracket champion for the championship.
The championship game is scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 12.
“We told the kids that we believe they can win it, we just need them to believe it as well,” Lynch said. “We went (to World Series two years ago) at 10, and we had no expectations. At that time, we were a team from a 30,000-person town in New Hampshire, and we’re taking on teams from all over the country with some teams from 75,000 to 100,000 towns.
More: 'Kids are ready to go': Dover 10-year-olds in Florida for Cal Ripken World Series
“But, when we went down there we realized we were as good as any of those teams,” Lynch continued. “We were a couple plays away from winning our pool. Two years later, at 12, our expectations we want to make it to the championship bracket and see what happens from there.”
Who's in Dover's six-team pool
Dover is in a pool with Flood City, Pennsylvania; Black Hills, Washington; West Raleigh, North Carolina; Boonville, Missouri; and Windsor, California.
Dover will open the tournament on Friday against Boonville at 10 a.m. Dover will then play Black Hills Saturday (5:30 p.m.), West Raleigh on Sunday (3 p.m.), Flood City on Monday (8 p.m.), and Windsor on Tuesday (10 a.m.). All times are EST.
Who's on this year's Dover team
The Dover all-stars are comprised of Ben Cheek, Brady Flynn, Camden Stowell, Connor Lynch, Desmond Fennessy, Ethan DeStefano, Jack Calhoun, Jaxon Plummer, Lucas Grigas, Matthew Maroon, Nolan Kinnicutt, Owen Lovering, Rhett Reed, Slayter Saucier and Trey Longuil.
Kevin Calhoun, Tim Kinnicutt and Rich Longuil are the assistant coaches.
The rest of the World Series field
The remaining 18 teams from the United States include Waipahu, Hawaii; Florence, Alabama; Yardley, Pennsylvania; Chicago, Illinois; Glen Allen, Virginia; Branson, Missouri; Lutz, Florida; Southeast Denver, Colorado; Honolulu, Hawaii; Marlboro, New Jersey; Bryant, Arkansas; Twin Falls, Idaho; Easton, Massachusetts; Southeast Lexington, Kentucky; Wells Fargo, North Dakota; Kennewick, Washington; Hot Springs, Arkansas; and Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
The 10 international teams are Sydney, Australia; San Nicolas, Aruba; Seoul, Korea; Nuevo Leon, Mexico; Yilan, Taiwan; Calgary, Canada; Kansai, Japan; Rotterdam, Netherlands; Guayama, Puerto Rico; and, San Juan, Puerto Rico.
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Dover 12s open Cal Ripken World Series Friday in Branson, Missouri
