Kingsville, MD, August, 30, 2010 —The Eclipse Base Ball Club of Elkton won its 4th straight Maryland 19th Century Base Ball State Championship on Sunday, August 29th at Jerusalem Mill in Kingsville, Maryland. After clinching the regular Maryland State Championship title with a 10-1 record, the Eclipse went in to the tournament as the number one seed for the 3rd straight year. This year, a record six clubs participated in the single elimination tournament. Elkton was joined by the Arundel Excelsiors, the Chesapeake Nine of Baltimore, the Havre de Grace Dauntless, the Potomac Base Ball Club of Washington and the Talbot Fair Plays.
In the first round, the Talbot Fair Plays defeated Arundel 12-0 while Chesapeake downed Havre de Grace 11-10 in 10 innings in the best game of the day. The semi finals saw Talbot down the second seeded Potomac Club 9-2 while Elkton knocked off Chesapeake 14-6. This set up the same championship match that has taken place the last 4 years- Talbot vs Elkton. The same result was had as the previous three years.
Elkton started the match scoring 1 run in the top of the first but Talbot came back with 2 in the bottom to take the lead. It was the last lead the Fair Plays would have all day. Elkton quickly came back and tied it at 2 after 2 innings. In the third, Elkton scored 5 runs and broke the spirit of the Fair Plays who were playing their 3rd game of the day. Elkton added on more runs and pulled away for a 19-6 victory to retain the pennant for a 4th straight year.
Tom Duffy from Elkton was the winning pitcher pitching a complete game to pick up his 20th win of the season. The victors chose Brian Howarth from Newark as the tournament MVP. Also playing a great match included Tim Bower from Rising Sun, Erik Myers from North East, Mike Phelan and Lee Donelson from Baltimore, Bruce Leith from Elkton, Ryan Gannon from Wilmington and Glyn Richards from Mt Ephraim, NJ. Other members of the champions include: Greg Rodenbaugh and Bill Freeland from North East, Jon Killpatrick, Roberto Soto and Jason Bromley from Oxford and Antoni Sekowski from Warwick.
The Eclipse will be playing in the Mid Atlantic Vintage Base Ball League’s Championship Tournament on October 3rd at Ft Mott, New Jersey and will be the league’s number 1 seed. (See www.mavbbl.com for more details). Elkton’s next match will be September 25th at 3:00pm at the Rising Sun American Legion grounds for the Rising Sun 150th Anniversary Celebration as they take on the Bohemia Eurekas.