Sunday, July 20
The Aces families all arrived at the Courtyard in Blue Springs by 5 pm, and the girls practiced for a couple of hours.  Then we had a pizza party at the hotel for all family members.  The girls played in the pool, and the parents played cards and dominoes in the lobby.

Monday, July 21
The Aces started the day at the skills competition, with Megan entered in the home run derby, Rhiannon and Lana Jo in the pitching contest, and the relay team of Stephanie, Kesha, Lindsey , and Kendall running the bases.  None of the entries qualified for the finals, but the girls made a good showing while the parents and the rest of the team cheered them on.

After the skills competition, the girls played a short practice game against the Oklahoma Lipps to get them ready for pool play the following day.

Opening ceremonies were held at the Blue Springs High School Monday evening.  The event started with pin trading in the parking lot.  The Aces pins were hot traders.  We are still hoping to hear that we won the pin contest, but we haven't seen any tournament pins, and they were the prize! 

Wednesday, July 23
For their final pool game, the Aces played the Blue Springs Black Ice at 8am.  The Aces already had the pool won, but played hard anyway.  The Black Ice scored two runs in the 2nd, and the Aces answered back with one, as Siera led off with a double and came home on a single by Ashley.  The Black Ice added another run in the 5th, and the Aces added one with a two-out double by Lana Jo, followed by a double by Rhiannon.  The Aces were down 3-2 starting the 6th, but came back to tie it up when Stephanie led off with a single and scored on a triple by Ashley.  The game went into ITB, and Rhiannon struck out the first batter, and two ground outs left the Black Ice runner stranded on third.  The Aces quickly moved their runner to 3rd and scored the winning run on a ground out by Amber, with the final score 4-3.  Kendall , Ashley, and Rhiannon each had two hits in the game, and Lindsey and Lana Jo each had one.  Rhiannon pitched 7 innings, with six strikeouts and no walks, with 6 hits and one earned run.

The girls had the rest of the day to do whatever they wanted.  Some families chose to go shopping at the nearby mall and take in a movie, while some went to the Blue Springs Lake near Coach Havard's campsite to swim and play sand volleyball.  The weather was incredible, with a nice breeze and temperatures in the 80's.

Thursday, July 24
Since the Aces won their pool, they got a bye the first round of bracket play and didn't play until 5pm.  All the girls and most of the siblings went to the movies to see "Finding Nemo" that afternoon before heading to the ball park.

The girls played their first bracket game against the Ralston Rampage from Nebraska on Thursday at 5pm.  The Rampage run-ruled the San Antonio Diamonds in their first game.  This game lasted only 5 innings as the Aces run-ruled the Rampage 8-0.  The Aces put 3 runs on the board in the 2nd as Ashley hit a single, and Kelsea slapped for a base hit.  Kesha reached on error as Ashley scored. Amber hit a triple to bring home two more runs.  The Aces rallied on two outs again in the 3rd, as Siera hit a two out single, and came home on a triple by Ashley. Kelsea reached on an error as Ashley scored.  Kesha singled to bring home another run.  The Aces added two runs in the 5th as Stephanie led off with a single, advanced on a passed ball and a groundout, and scored as Kelsea hit a single and tried to go to 2nd to draw the throw. Kesha singled, and Amber singled to bring her home.  The game was called after 5 innings due to run rule.  The Aces allowed only two hits, with one error, as Lana Jo struck out 4 and walked only one in five innings. 

The team and parents went out to Joe's Crab Shack to eat after the game, and had a fun time partying on the patio.  We even celebrated Coach Kim's birthday (a little early), as the waiters had her perform "I'm a Little Tea Pot" for the crowd!

Friday, July 25
The Texas Aces faced the Oklahoma Heat at 9:45 am on Friday at the Hidden Valley Complex. After 4 1/2 scoreless innings, the Aces got agressive and put the ball into play, forcing the Heat to make several errors, and allowing the Aces to put 5 runs on the board.  Kelsea led off the 5th with a walk, and Stephanie bunted safely to advance Kelsea .  However, the Heat overthrew 1st and Kelsea scored.  Stephanie was tagged out trying to get to 3rd.  Amber then bunted for a single, and advanced on a sac bunt by Kendall.  Lindsey caught the Heat off guard as she bunted for another single and advanced Amber to 3rd.  Lindsey stole second, and Megan walked to load the bases.  Rhiannon followed with a single to bring home two runs.  Lana Jo grounded to short, but a bad throw to 1st hit Lana Jo and allowed two more runs to score.  In the 6th, Stephanie hit a single on one out, but was forced out at 2nd.  Kendall hit a single on two outs, and Lindsey followed with another single to bring home another run.  The Aces allowed 4 hits with no errors, and shut out the OK Heat 6-0.  Rhiannon had six strikeouts and no walks in the game.

That afternoon, the Aces hung out together and had cook out at Blue Springs Lake.  More pictures may one day be added to the photo album!

Saturday, July 26
The Aces played the College Station Texas Smash at 8:00 am at Hidden Valley.  The Aces were home team.  After getting up on the Smash 3-0 in the first inning, a critial 2-out error in the third allowed the Smash two runs, and then they tied it up before the inning was over.   The Smash scored again in the 4th, and the Aces came back and tied it up at 4-4.  After 7 innings, the score was still tied 4-4, so the game went into ITB.  The Smash were able to put across three runs in the 8th, and the Aces could only come back with one, leaving the final score 7-5.

The Aces had to turn around immediately and play the Kansas City Zephyrs.  The Zephyrs scored one run in the 3rd and one in the 4th.  The Aces answered back with one in the 5th. With runners on 2nd & 3rd and only one out in the 6th, Rhiannon bunted and Lindsey went for home. Lindsey slid across the plate and the catcher brought the tag down on her chest, but she was called out! (Local team, local umps!)  Twice when the teams were reversed and the play was close, the runners were called safe.  The final score was 2-4.  It was a hard loss to take.  But the Aces had a couple of opportunities with two runners on and no outs where they did not score.

All in all, the Aces made a good showing, and finished tied for 17th out of 90 teams in the tournament.  Not bad for a young 14U team.