Texas baseball championships are a tale of two cities
By Rick Thomas
Two Texas cities, Texarkana and Corpus Christi, are located about 500 miles apart, illustrating just a small portion of the massive Lone Star State.
And teams from those two cities will decide the Class 4A and 3A, Division 1, baseball championships on Thursday and Friday at Dell Diamond in Round Rock, Texas.
Top-ranked Liberty-Eylau (36-4) goes for its second straight baseball title against the fifth-ranked London Pirates (34-6) at 7 p.m. Thursday night.
The Leopards captured the Class 4A crown last year against perennial powerhouse Corpus Christi Calallen, 3-1, before moving to 3A, Division 1 this season. They are making their third straight championship game appearance.
The University Interscholastic League (UIL), governing body for athletics in Texas, separated Classes 2A through 6A into Division 1 (large school) and Division 2 (small school) this year. A total of 11 state champions (only one in Class A) will be crowned Thursday through Saturday at Dell Diamond, home of the Round Rock Express, the Texas Rangers’ Triple-A affiliate.
Calallen (34-2), which has won eight state baseball titles, made it back to the 4A final, where the Wildcats collide with Pleasant Grove (35-4). That game is set to start at noon Friday at Dell Diamond, where all state title games will be played this year.
Calallen started the season with 23 straight victories before losing to Bishop, 3-2, in 8 innings. The Wildcats’ other setback was a 5-4 decision to San Antonio Reagan.
Calallen has gone 8-0 in the playoffs.
London and Calallen are located about 5 miles apart in this coastal city of 317,000. Texarkana has a combined population of 65,580, with the Texas side having 36,593 and the Arkansas side 29,387.
Another Northeast Texas team, Longview Spring Hill (34-7), will battle Wimberley (26-7-1) for the 4A, Division 2 title at 9 a.m. Friday.
Liberty-Eylau and Pleasant Grove waltzed through five rounds of the state playoffs, going a combined 20-0.
The Texarkana teams also have a combined record of 71-8 (.899 winning percentage).
The Leopards punched their ticket to the Class 3A, Division 1 state title game by completing a 2-0 sweep over Iowa Park at Forney High School’s field.
The Leopards shut out Iowa Park, 4-0, in Game 2 that followed a dramatic 7-2 come-from-behind victory in the opener.
London is making its fifth straight state tournament appearance since 2021. The Pirates are seeking their second state baseball title, their first coming in 2022.
Pleasant Grove, which will be making its 6th State Championship Game appearance, can accomplish two monumental things by winning the state final.
First, the Hawks would set a school record for most single-season wins and also give coach Riley Fincher his second state crown (and the Hawks' fourth).
Pleasant Grove finished 35-3 in 2017, losing to eventual state champion Abilene Wylie, 3-1, in the state semifinals.
Only two teams, rival Liberty-Eylau and district opponent Sulphur Springs, have beaten the Hawks this season. Both teams won a pair of games against Pleasant Grove, but the Hawks defeated the Leopards in the team’s first meeting this year.
Liberty-Eylau’s losses have been to Spring Hill, Longview, Pleasant Grove, and DeKalb.
Only one other Texas city, Kingwood, has two schools competing in the state tournament. Those teams are Kingwood High and Kingwood Park.
If you would like to comment about this story or to make suggestions for other stories, local writer Rick Thomas can be reached at his email: rickythomas7140@icloud.com.