The zone tournament play wrapped up last night for all the Northeast Kansas league legion ball clubs as Seneca and Royal Valley both ended their league seasons.

Meeting up for the second time in the Zone 4 tournament, Seneca and Royal Valley took on each other in an elimination game to stay alive in the tournament and play Silver Lake. Royal Valley took the lead just like the first game of the tournament but this time held on to it for the 11-5 win, after getting out a 6-0 start after two innings. Seneca closed the gap to three runs, 7-4 going into the sixth but Royal Valley would score four more runs to secure the win. Royal Valley utilized a complete game pitching outing by Mucks Wahweotten and a good offensive night from Gino Vicchiullo, who had two hits and three runs scored, to notch the win. Seneca wrapped up their baseball season 24-7 on the year.

With the win Royal Valley turned around quickly to take on Silver Lake, with Royal Valley playing their fifth game in as many days, fighting off elimination three times. Both teams got on the board early as after one inning it was 2-1, Silver Lake with the lead. Silver Lake would do a majority of the scoring after that, as the never trailed in the game.

Silver Lake's offense, not only was potent has they pounded out a 10-1 lead going into the sixth, but their pitching was great, too. Tyler Brown shutdown Royal Valley sending them down in order in the second, third, fourth and fifth innings, before Royal Valley eventually got on the board again plating four in the sixth on seven hits. Brown finished the night, throwing a complete game, giving up five runs on 10 hits with five strikeouts.

While, Royal Valley plated four runs in the sixth Silver Lake was not done scoring also plating eight more runs in the game, to win it 18-5 and advance to the AA legion baseball state tournament for the first time since 2005.

Offensively in the loss for Royal Valley, Vicchiullo and Logan Bausch each had two hits and two runs scored, while Josh Tessendorf had two hits with three RBI. Vicchiullo pitched the first five innings giving up eight runs (five earned) on nine hits, Tessendorf pitched the final two innings. 

For Silver Lake they were lead by Tyler Brown's pitching performance and Travis Brown's five RBI, including a three-run home run. Silver Lake's offense saw eight of the nine batters tally a hit and every player score at least one run.

Royal Valley finishes their legion baseball season 15-24, with a very solid performance overall in the zone tournament.

With the Royal Valley and Seneca losses that means only one Northeast Kansas league legion team will be participating in the Class AA state tournament, which will be Sabetha as they are hosting the tournament at Somerset park this year. The Class AA state tournament starts next Wednesday August 1st in Sabetha.

For updated NEK standings/records (click here)