EMA Juniors World Series Bound!
In 1953, District 18 Little League Baseball was established in the San Gabriel Valley. It eventually grew to include 16 Little Leagues including El Monte American Little League. In 1958 District 18 held its first Little League Baseball All-Star Tournament which was won by Norwood Village Little League now known as El Monte National.
Over the past 52 years more than 56,000 players from District 18 have competed for a chance to participate in a World Series. In 1978 the Sunnyslope Senior Softball team became our first and only team ever to reach a World Series. Tuesday night the El Monte American Little League Juniors won the Western Regional Championship to become the first baseball team in District 18 history to advance to a World Series. They beat Rocklin 16-3 and will travel to Michigan Friday morning.
These young men from Pioneer Park will be the Western United States representative in the 10 Team International World Series competing against four teams from the United States and teams from Chinese Tapai, Guatemala, Mexico, Canada and the Ukraine.
EMA has lost only twice in the six tournaments leading up to the Series. They went undefeated in the TOC, District and the Sectionals. The Juniors then lost once to Chino Hills in the Sub-Division, went undefeated in Division, and lost once to Alaska in the Regional.
We’ve mentioned the players and the manager before during this amazing run but their names deserve to be seen again. Here you go.
Manager: Sergio Juarez
Coaches: Armando Verdugo & Antonio Ruiz
Players:
Nicolas Brown
Gabriel Juarez
Antonio Ruiz
Noeh Martinez
Fernando Rosales
Ricardo Perez
Gabriel Soto
Bryan Velasquez
Cesar Torres
Kevin Fuentes
Armani Garcia
Diego Palomino
Johnny Alvarez
Armando Verdugo
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