- Apr 11, 2012
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In Kansas City this past weekend a great new tournament called the "Top Gun Invitational" with teams from 20 states, including Florida, Arizona, Texas, Tennessee, Nebraska and some really salty 16A teams.....the tournament director has worked his arss off for the last year to make it happen and he delivered.....all the teams were good and it had a "nationals" feel competition wise. Lots of college coaches there and spectators.
Although we had to share the title, I got to give our players credit for last weeks performance, as they played some great softball. Ourteam and a team from Wichita were declared "co-champs" after playing each other 26 innings over three games (one pool, one winners bracket, one championship)....we won the final winners bracket game in 10 innings and got beat in the first finals game in 9 innings....
So that set the stage for the "if game"....both teams were exhausted from 11 games in 4 days (1.5 time limits too)....after losing in the championship game, everyone was dreading another game as it was 9:00pm. The other coach came up to us and told us his team was gassed and still had a 3.5 hour bus ride home and asked if our team would be willing to flip a coin for 1st and 2nd Place....so we went to ask the girls. As tired as they all were, two of our "committed" players were the first ones to bark outinstantly "no-way....we'll play....we like our chances and came to far to settle for anything less".....I was amazed, as I am the AC and was pretty worn out myself....we even had a pitcher on the DL begging to help her team if they had to play another one. When we told the opposing HC our girls response, he chuckled like "wow" and then commented how gutty they all were....so we asked, if both teams were declared "co-champs" would that be acceptable. The tournament directors all agreed, both teams and coaching staff agreed and all the girlson both teams were satified and had a great deal of mutual respect for each other despite some pretty tense moments competing against each other. We did flip for the hardware and won, so our girls got a pretty expensive piece of etched glass of of it....but most important to them was it wasn't second place. on the website results...
But I wonder if we did, as coaches, the right thing....you hate being unreasonable with a team from out of town who has a reasonable request and its really late on Sunday night.....
Top Gun Invitational - Home
Although we had to share the title, I got to give our players credit for last weeks performance, as they played some great softball. Ourteam and a team from Wichita were declared "co-champs" after playing each other 26 innings over three games (one pool, one winners bracket, one championship)....we won the final winners bracket game in 10 innings and got beat in the first finals game in 9 innings....
So that set the stage for the "if game"....both teams were exhausted from 11 games in 4 days (1.5 time limits too)....after losing in the championship game, everyone was dreading another game as it was 9:00pm. The other coach came up to us and told us his team was gassed and still had a 3.5 hour bus ride home and asked if our team would be willing to flip a coin for 1st and 2nd Place....so we went to ask the girls. As tired as they all were, two of our "committed" players were the first ones to bark outinstantly "no-way....we'll play....we like our chances and came to far to settle for anything less".....I was amazed, as I am the AC and was pretty worn out myself....we even had a pitcher on the DL begging to help her team if they had to play another one. When we told the opposing HC our girls response, he chuckled like "wow" and then commented how gutty they all were....so we asked, if both teams were declared "co-champs" would that be acceptable. The tournament directors all agreed, both teams and coaching staff agreed and all the girlson both teams were satified and had a great deal of mutual respect for each other despite some pretty tense moments competing against each other. We did flip for the hardware and won, so our girls got a pretty expensive piece of etched glass of of it....but most important to them was it wasn't second place. on the website results...
But I wonder if we did, as coaches, the right thing....you hate being unreasonable with a team from out of town who has a reasonable request and its really late on Sunday night.....
Top Gun Invitational - Home
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