Two special teams had already laid the foundation. When Portsmouth (New Hampshire) Little League won its first state championship in over a quarter-century during the 2002 international tournament, the Granite State champions went on to reach the semifinal round of the New England Region tournament in Bristol, Connecticut. Two years later, Portsmouth returned to Bristol, and progressed one step further, advancing to the championship game before bowing to Lincoln (Rhode Island) Little League, 3-0.

Mark McCauley, the manager of Portsmouth's 2006 edition, knew his team had an opportunity to enhance the league's legacy: most members of his squad were holdovers from the state's 9-10 year old championship team in 2004, and all-everything pitcher Jordan Bean gained an extra year of eligibility thanks to a change in how Little League Baseball determines a player's age in a given calendar year. McCauley's team eyed the chance to break new ground.

"We would like to be the (Portsmouth) team that has gone the farthest," he explained on the eve of the region tournament. "To do that, we have to win the (New England) championship game. We don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but there is another level we can achieve together."

McCauley kept his team focused on the present -- Portsmouth's players were forbidden to utter the word "Bristol" until after an 11-4 victory over Manchester East Little League clinched the state championship -- and Bean's powerful right arm provided the extra gear the team needed to take the next step.

Bean struck out thirteen batters and threw a three-hitter, and Keegan Taylor drove in all of his team's runs as Portsmouth blanked Glastonbury American (Connecticut) Little League, 3-0, before a crowd of 8,000 mostly pro-Connecticut fans in the New England Region championship game.

"It's unbelievable," said McCauley after his team became New Hampshire's fourth-ever Little League World Series qualifier.

"We weren't sure exactly how good we'd be in New England," explained the Portsmouth manager. "Once we got down here, we felt like we belonged. And it was a great experience."

Penciling in Bean as your starting pitcher is a sure-fire way to enhance your experience. The Portsmouth ace allowed only one run over the course of three starts in Bristol, including a dominating championship game effort. Bean allowed one, two, and three hits in his three region tournament starts, after allowing a total of two hits in five earlier starts against New Hampshire teams.

"He's got a fire to compete like no kid I've ever seen, and he has a skill and determination to match, which is a very good feeling to have," said McCauley prior to the championship game.

Taylor did much of the damage offensively for Portsmouth. After the first two batters were retired in the third, the center fielder opened the scoring by driving his fourth home run of the tournament over the left field fence. The next inning, two walks sandwiched around John Graham's infield single loaded the bases with no outs, and after two strikeouts, Taylor lined a high inside fastball off the left center field fence to drive in Connor McCauley and Graham.

Glastonbury's major threat came in the top of the first inning. Bobby Solecki led off the game with a double, then a walk and Mike Mainuli's infield single loaded the bases with one out. But Bean struck out the next two hitters looking, one on a full count fastball and another on a sharp-breaking curve.

"Our game plan was to get to him early," explained Connecticut manager Tracy Michalek. "We're a late-hitting team. We felt if we could get to him early, (we'd have a chance). We were close."

"We felt like we had our best game today," said McCauley of Portsmouth's performance. "No errors. We were really focused on getting this done. I'm proud of the kids for doing it."

Error-free defense isn't usually a key when Bean pitches -- the right-hander averaged well over two strikeouts per inning throughout the international tournament, and fanned 18 and 14 batters in his two previous starts. But Portsmouth's defense needed to make three tough plays in the final inning to seal the victory. Matthew Feeney barehanded a well-placed bunt down the third base line and threw to retire Glastonbury's first hitter, then first baseman Cam Cundy handled a squibber down the opposite line. Shortstop Billy Hartmann then snared a hard-hit grounder that punched Portsmouth's ticket to South Williamsport.

"Just good baseball in the sixth inning," said McCauley.

It was the only time in 18 innings pitched at Bristol that Bean failed to record a strikeout.

"Sometimes we catch ourselves watching him," noted McCauley earlier in the tournament. "I have to remind the guys who are out there defensively for us to stay on their toes. It's very easy to watch him work. He's that good, where he can lull you to sleep when you're on his own team."

Portsmouth reached the championship game only after a controversial finish resulted in a forfeit win in its semifinal round game against Colchester (Vermont) Little League. A back-and-forth start between the two well-matched teams produced three lead changes and a tie in the early innings, and Colchester took a 9-7 lead on Nate Frieberg's two-run homer in the bottom of the fifth. But Vermont's coaching staff realized that one of the team's reserves had not yet made a plate appearance, and would not do so if Colchester closed out the win in the top of the sixth. Tournament rules stipulated that Colchester would forfeit the win if Portsmouth protested this violation of mandatory play requirements, and as a result, would be eliminated from the tournament. (The minimum penalty for a mandatory play violation was changed to a managerial suspension following the 2006 international tournament.)

Portsmouth scored once, and had Conor Trefethan on first base with two outs when, after a conference on the mound, the game turned inside out: it ended on the field with the defense attempting to allow runs to force the game to the bottom of the sixth, and the offense holding its baserunners on deliberate overthrows before ending the game with an intentional strikeout that preserved the 9-8 score. Vermont's manager and pitcher were both ejected during the final inning after ignoring an umpire warning to cease intentionally wild pitches.

Two hours after the game, tournament officials awarded Portsmouth a forfeit victory based on the mandatory play violation.

"Obviously, it was a coaching mistake," Colchester manager Dennis Place said of the missed at-bat immediately after the game. "It was an oversight, and I take full responsibility.

"The kids played such good baseball all week," he added. "They represented Vermont well."

"That's a great team," said Mark McCauley. "And that's the shame of it, Those kids battled and so did ours. It was a good baseball game. It's sad that it had to be decided like that. It really is."

Prior to the final inning, Taylor and Bean delivered back-to-back home runs to give Portsmouth a 3-1 lead in the third, before Colchester responded with three-run shots from Josh Place and Matt Roy in the bottom of the inning. Trefethen's grand slam in the fifth knotted the score and set the stage for Frieberg's go-ahead blast.

The next day, Portsmouth was able to put the well-publicized controversy behind them, and move past Glastonbury American in the championship game. Mark McCauley pointed to two keys that helped his team's focus in the title game.

"Number one, we were able to play baseball, which is what we wanted to do," said the Portsmouth manager. "Number two, we got a message through one of the (tournament volunteers) which Vermont relayed to me. They wished us well and were sorry that the game ended the way it did... It meant everything to me. I appreciate that, and it allowed us to focus on baseball."

Portsmouth's focus was equally critical earlier in the week, thanks to a particularly strong and evenly-matched set of teams in the New England field. Three days into the tournament, each of the six participants had exactly one win, and all six were still in the hunt entering the final day of pool competition.

"I've never seen such an evenly-matched bracket in the tournament," said Randy Hien, manager of six-time region tournament qualifier Lincoln (Rhode Island) Little League.

"We could be (seeded) one, or we could be (fifth)," remarked Peabody Western (Massachusetts) Little League coach Ed Aiello on his team's potential fate as it prepared for its final pool game against Glastonbury American.

Portsmouth earned the second seed entering the semifinal round, thanks to wins in its first three pool games. Bean helped the team start the tournament on the right foot, registering all eighteen outs via strikeout in a 1-0 victory over Colchester. Hartmann led off the bottom of the first inning with a walk, and eventually scored on Trefethan's single to provide the game's only run.

The New Hampshire champions, who had been idle for two weeks after winning the state championship, managed only five hits against Vermont pitcher Josh Place.

"Give credit to their pitcher," said Mark McCauley. "They realized fastballs aren't going to go by our hitters, and curveballs are a relatively new experience for us. After that first inning, he composed himself and ... had our hitters off-balance."

Two days later, Portsmouth spotted Yarmouth (Maine) Little League an early 1-0 lead, then roared back with six runs in the third to take control of the game. Feeney's single to left field drove in the first run, then Connor McCauley singled home a pair of runs to put New Hampshire in front. Taylor and Graham later added run-scoring singles, while Graham and Pierce Gendron did the same to produce two insurance runs in the fifth.

The win set up a rematch of sorts when Portsmouth met Lincoln for the first time since their region championship game meeting two years earlier. Bean (two hits and 14 strikeouts) and Rhode Island pitcher Ryan O'Dell (four hits, 10 strikeouts) battled to a 1-1 stalemate through the first six innings, before both offenses awoke in the seventh inning of a 7-4 New Hampshire win.

"The two best pitchers in the tournament threw today," said Hien. "We saw (Bean) pitch his first game and he is outstanding. And we all know what O'Dell can do (two wins and a 2-1 loss in the Rhode Island state tournament)."

"Boy, did we want that game," said Mark McCauley.

"To some extent, this game was for them," he said, referring to Portsmouth's 2004 team.

Taylor's three-run homer over the left center field fence capped Portsmouth's big inning after Hartmann and Feeney drove in the inning's initial runs. Lincoln used three hits, a pair of walks, and three errors to produce its runs, but their rally was cut short when Connor McCauley recorded the inning's second out by throwing out a baserunner who had strayed too far off of second base.

A hard-luck Lincoln team lost extra inning games to both eventual finalists, and defeated top-seeded Peabody Western in ten innings during its four pool games. The team's luck worsened several weeks after the tournament, when Hien was killed in a roadside accident near his Lincoln home.

Peabody Western, which homered seven times in its pool opener and registered three shutouts, was upended by Glastonbury, 3-2, in the tourney's other semifinal game. Peabody Western had routed the Connecticut team, 11-0, earlier in the tournament, but Glastonbury pitchers Dave Kravies and Solecki held the Massachusetts team to two runs despite allowing eight hits in the rematch.

Peabody took a 2-1 lead on Kevin Church's two-out single in the fourth, then Glastonbury moved in front for good in the fifth. Chris Oechsli tied the game by scoring on a sacrifice fly after Massachusetts' right fielder made a diving catch of Steve Michalek's flyball. Solecki then scored on a throwing error after a Peabody infielder made a diving stop of Mainuli's grounder.

"Defense has held us together for the whole tournament," said Glastonbury manager Tracy Michalek, whose team committed just three errors in six games in Bristol. "And we got the bats going, finally."

Glastonbury's nine hits in the win exceeded the eight that the Connecticut champion produced in its prior three games combined.

The next day, Bean held Glastonbury's offense to just three hits, as Portsmouth took its giant step forward.

"If it wasn't for their legacy and experience," said McCauley of the previous Portsmouth teams, "we wouldn't have been able to kick down the door.

"I don't know how we're going to stack up (at the Little League World Series)," added the New Hampshire manager. "But I do know this: we're going to go down there and play the way we know how, and that's at 110%, from inning one through six."

Portsmouth more than held its own in South Williamsport, winning two of its three pool games before falling to eventual World Series champion Columbus Northern (Georgia) Little League in the U.S. semifinals.

Linescores:

Pool Play Game 1	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10		R	H	E
Peabody Western (Massachusetts)	0	2	2	5	6							15	15	0
Yarmouth (Maine)	0	0	0	0	0							0	1	5
Pool Play Game 2
Lincoln (Rhode Island)	0	3	0	0	0	0	0					3	6	3
Glastonbury American (Connecticut)	1	0	0	0	2	0	1					4	6	1
Pool Play Game 3
Colchester (Vermont)	0	0	0	0	0	0						0	1	0
Portsmouth (New Hampshire)	1	0	0	0	0	x						1	5	0
Pool Play Game 4
Lincoln (Rhode Island)	0	0	0	0	0	2						2	7	0
Yarmouth (Maine)	0	6	0	0	0	x						6	9	0
Pool Play Game 5
Peabody Western (Massachusetts)	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0		1	6	1
Lincoln (Rhode Island)	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	2		3	9	1
Pool Play Game 6
Glastonbury American (Connecticut)	0	0	0	0	0	0						0	5	0
Colchester (Vermont)	5	0	0	0	1	x						6	8	0
Pool Play Game 7
Yarmouth (Maine)	1	0	0	2	0	0						3	4	3
Portsmouth (New Hampshire)	0	0	6	0	2	x						8	10	0
Pool Play Game 8
Peabody Western (Massachusetts)	0	0	0	2	0	0						2	5	0
Colchester (Vermont)	0	0	0	0	0	0						0	1	1
Pool Play Game 9
Portsmouth (New Hampshire)	0	0	0	1	0	0	6					7	9	3
Lincoln (Rhode Island)	0	0	0	0	0	1	3					4	5	2
Pool Play Game 10
Peabody Western (Massachusetts)	0	5	0	6								11	8	2
Glastonbury American (Connecticut)	0	0	0	0								0	0	2
Pool Play Game 11
Yarmouth (Maine)	2	2	0	0	0	0						4	7	2
Colchester (Vermont)	2	1	5	0	3	x						11	13	0
Pool Play Game 12
Portsmouth (New Hampshire)	1	0	0	0	1	0						2	9	1
Glastonbury American (Connecticut)	0	2	0	0	1	x						3	3	0
Semifinal Round
Portsmouth (New Hampshire)	0	0	3	0	4	1						8	-	3
Colchester (Vermont)	1	0	6	0	2	x						9	5	3
(Note - Portsmouth was awarded a 6-0 forfeit victory in this game following a mandatory play violation by Vermont.)
Semifinal Round
Glastonbury American (Connecticut)	0	0	1	0	2	0						3	9	0
Peabody Western (Massachusetts)	0	1	0	1	0	0						2	8	1
Championship Game
Glastonbury American (Connecticut)	0	0	0	0	0	0						0	3	0
Portsmouth (New Hampshire)	0	0	1	2	0	x						3	7	0

---

Toward the past

Toward the present

---

The Unpage brings you unprecedented tournament coverage.
Thank-you for visiting