DAYTON TOURNAMENT A SUCCESS
Despite the problems with a date change and the dreaded JULY 4 weekend schedule the DAYTON FIRST FLIGHT TOURNAMENT held JULY 6-8 at KETTERING FIELD COMPLEX came up only three teams short of the 2017 event.
“It took a lot of scrambling,” TOURNAMENT DIRECTOR JOHN ZAMPATTI said. “We were planning on 40 plus teams this year but we lost teams because they had already scheduled a tournament elsewhere because they were unaware of our new dates. We also ran into competition with the SHELBYVILLE tournament.”
“We survived this year and I am sure now that teams are aware of our new dates we can have forty entries in 2019..” he said.
The attendance at this year's FIRST FLIGHT may have been down a little but the competition didn’t suffer with “IF” games and close games scattered throughout.
MJ LOWE took the 50 AAA crown with a 25-21 “IF” game victory over the DAYTON LEGENDS. The LEGENDS forced the “IF” game beating MJ LOWE 21-6. Dayton also beat TEAM ILLINOIS 18-13 to reach the finals.
MJ LOWE was undefeated with a 20-10 win over the LEGENDS and 23-20 against FREDERICKS WINE AND DINE in earlier bracket play until the LEGENDS beat them in the semi-finals.
The other team in the five-team bracket was OHIO HITMEN.
The DAYTON LEGENDS 55’S beat IS/WB 29-28 and 21-18 to take the 50/55 MAJOR championship. IS/WB beat JJ FINANCIAL 34-25 and 28-24 to reach the finals.
TOUCH EM ALL took home the trophy in the 55 AAA bracket with a 19-15 verdict over I IUNDER CRAFT AND BEER in the finals. They had previously beaten ANTIQUE ROAD SHOW (18-17) and SIDELINE BULL MOOSE 25-16 in opening games.
I UNDER reached the finals out of the losers’ bracket 26-18 over ANTIQUE ROAD SHOW.
Others in the seven team bracket were BUCKEYE CLASSICS,DETROIT CONNECTION and SENIOR PSYCHOSIS>
The 60 AA/AAA crown went to the CINCINNATI 60’S with a 34-15 win over UNIVERSAL SOFTBALL in the title game.
CINCINNATI has sent UNIVERSAL to the loser’s bracket earlier but UNIVERSAL came back reaching the finals with a 27-17 win over the DAYTON DIAMOND DAWGS.
UNIVERSAL SOFTBALL downed CAVCO 27-24 in an “IF” game championship game in the 65 AA/AAA bracket.
CAVCO had forced the game with a 16-12 win over UNIVERSAL.
Until the loss to CAVCO, UNIVERSAL had bested DAYTON LEGENDS 29-18 and CAVCO 24-22 in the opening bracket game. INDY FOG was the fourth team in the bracket.
The 70AA/75 crown went to COSSA with 21-20 and32-22 wins over the DAYTON LEGENDS 75’s.
DAYTON DIAMOND DOGS and LEGENDS OF DAYTON were the others in the bracket.
The DAYTON LEGENDS 70’S beat WINDSOR CHIEF 18-15 twice for the title.