See Pool Play Standings for Saturday's won/loss records and seeding for Sunday's single elimination bracket.

St. Joe Frontier Casino Players, Team Rainey in Rose Cup Finals

St. Joe Frontier Casino Players from St. Joe, Missouri and Team Rainey, of Orange County California are the finalists in the 2003 Portland DeMarini Rose Cup Tournament, in Portland, Oregon.   The final results will be posted as soon as word comes out of Portland on the championship game.

Frontier Casino, of course, is the defending 2002 ISC World Champion and ASA Major National Champion, and entered the tournament as the odd-on favorite. They did not disappoint, and played some sparkling fastpitch over the weekend.

Team Rainey was the runner up in last year's NAFA "AA" World Series, and has moved up to the "AAA" level in a big way.  Team Rainey was 2-1 in round robin play on Saturday, earning the #2 seed in their pool behind Victoria Traveller's Inn.  Team Rainey defeated Bodle Chiropractice 9-1 this morning, then knocked off a tough Hobnobber's Team from Seattle Washington.   Team Rainey shortstop Rod Rainey suffered an injury today, when a sliding runner sliced his arm, requiring Rainey to leave for stitches.  Not the type of player to beg out of a lineup, even with the injury, Rainey returned to play in the semi-finals against the Vancouver Grey Sox, who edged Victoria
Traveller's Inn, 5-4.

Team Rainey led the Grey Sox 4-2, but Vancouver rallied to tie the game at 4.   In the bottom of the seventh inning, with two on, it was none other than a bandaged Rod Rainey who stepped to the plate, and delivered the game winner, a single up the middle to put Team Rainey into the finals against St. Joe Frontier Casino Players.  It marks the second tournament finals for Team Rainey, who was runner-up to Circle Tap, WI last month, in the ASA California Las Vegas International Tournament in Las Vegas, NV.

St. Joe Frontier Casino Players reached the Rose Cup finals with a perfect 5-0 record, notching 3 wins yesterday, then eliminating Bucknell Park of Olympia WA, then beating Portland DeMarini Merchants, 3-1, in their second close game in two days.  Frontier is led by a pitching staff of Michael White, Doug Middleton and Robby O'Brien.

[Saturday, June 28, 2003] - St. Joe Frontier Casino Players from St. Joe Missouri showed why they are the defending ISC World Champion and ASA Major Champion from 2002, going 3-0 enroute to the top seeding in Sunday's elimination bracket.  Host Portland DeMarini gave them all they could handle, though, before falling 3-2 in the day's final and best attended game so far.  Portland trailed early 3-0, but climbed back into the game, and had the bases loaded before Newfoundland pitcher Robby O'Brien escaped with the win.

Team Rainey is the tournament's lone 2-0 team as the tournament heads into the 3:00 pm games.  ISC World and ASA Major champion St. Joe Frontier Casino Players won their first game 7-1 over the So Cal Bombers and are playing once beaten Vancouver Grey Sox as this report goes to press.  For complete scores of the first 12 games, click the "Scoreboard" menu button on the left.

Victoria Traveller's Inn took the other top seed, behind the strong pitching of Colin McKenzie. 

Briefly:  There were a couple of upsets during the day, at least using rankings as the measuring stick.  Hobnobbers knocked off Victoria Traveller's Inn and Team Lyons, both Top 25 teams;  Sun Devils from Burbank CA rallied late in the game to knock off Vancouver's Grey Sox.  Team Lyons scored 14 runs in its first game, only to have its normally potent offense muster only one more run on the day in its remaining two games.

Team Rainey continued to turn heads, finishing 2-1, losing only 2-0 to Victoria after winning its first two games.  Victoria led Rainey 1-0 into the 6th inning.

Some interesting matchups on Sunday include a battle for British Columbia between Vancouver and Meralomas, and a battle for hometown Portland, with CR Adidas facing off with host Portland DeMarini Merchants.

The championship game is slated for 3:00 p.m. Sunday.