The sudden end of their season on Monday didn’t upset Palo Alto National Majors All-Stars too terribly much — as soon as their post-game meeting was over, several players gathered and demanded to be interviewed for this story.
OK, so what has the past three weeks meant to them?
Rowan Felsch, who threw two perfect innings in his team’s 10-8 loss to San Mateo American:
“We played as a team, and that’s the important thing, We played hard the whole month and we played for each other.”
Nick Teng, who reached base three times and had two RBI:
“We hit the ball well. It was fun. We did good.”
Junior Soliman, who had two home runs as Palo Alto staged another furious comeback:
“Our team never gave up. We’re proud of that.”
Josh Dawson:
“We were connected the whole time. We’re a close group. I have no clue where the team party will be, but I hope there’s swimming and a lot of cheeseburgers.”
Palo Alto played six games in the double-elimination event, and it was a feast. They went 4-2, with seven home runs in their last three games. Much like the loss that sent them to the elimination bracket last week, a 10-9 defeat to San Mateo American, this one was also a comeback effort that fell just short.
After taking a 3-0 lead in the first on Soliman’s homer, Palo Alto gave up six in the second, as San Mateo collected six hits, among them a double and a three-run homer. And Palo Alto went down 10-3 in the top of the fourth.
But they soon came back, with Teng’s two-run single in the fourth making it 10-5, and homers by Soliman (solo) and Felsch (two runs) pulling them to within two runs in the fifth.
But despite a shutout top of the sixth by Felsch, Palo Alto couldn’t generate any more offense in the bottom of the inning.
San Mateo goes on to play Pacifica American Tuesday at 10 a.m. at Holbrook-Palmer Park for the title. A challenge game, if necessary, would be on Wednesday (Pacifica is undefeated).
“It was a great all-star season,” said manager Todd Duncan,whose son, Elias, had six home runs in the six games. “They picked each other up and played hard the whole way. Someday they’ll look back on all the good things that happened and remember all the fun they had.”
And, hopefully, all the cheeseburgers.