Day 1 (Saturday, August 7):
Viera/Suntree (Florida) 14, Ripley (West Virginia) 1 (5 innings)
Columbus Northern (Georgia) 2, Carolina Forest (South Carolina) 1
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina) 4, Huntsville Eastern (Alabama) 3
SYA East (Virginia) 18, Spring Hill (Tennessee) 1 (4 innings)

Day 2 (Sunday, August 8):
Columbus Northern (Georgia) 8, Huntsville Eastern (Alabama) 7
Viera/Suntree (Florida) 4, SYA East (Virginia) 0
Ripley (West Virginia) 11, Spring Hill (Tennessee) 6 (8 innings)
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina) 14, Carolina Forest (South Carolina) 2 (5 innings)

Day 3 (Monday, August 9):
Viera/Suntree (Florida) 5, Spring Hill (Tennessee) 0
Huntsville Eastern (Alabama) 10, Carolina Forest (South Carolina) 3
Ripley (West Virginia) 3, SYA East (Virginia) 2
Columbus Northern (Georgia) 7, Winston-Salem National (North Carolina) 3 (7 innings)

Pool 'A' Standings	W	L	Runs Allowed
Viera/Suntree (Florida)	3	0	1
Ripley (West Virginia)	2	1	22
SYA East (Virginia)	1	2	8
Spring Hill (Tennessee)	0	3	34
Pool 'B' Standings	W	L	Runs Allowed
Columbus Northern (Georgia)	3	0	11
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina)	2	1	12
Huntsville Eastern (Alabama)	1	2	14
Carolina Forest (South Carolina)	0	3	26

The top two teams in each pool advance to the semifinal round.

Ties are broken based on records in head-to-head competition among tied teams. If a clear winner cannot be determined from head-to-head results, the tie is broken by calculating the ratio of runs allowed to defensive innings played for all teams involved in the tie. The team with the lowest runs-per-defensive-inning ratio advances.

In the event of a tie involving three or more teams, once the initial tie is broken, the remaining tied teams are again compared on head-to-head record to determine if a clear winner can be identified. If no clear winner can be identified from head-to-head results among the remaining tied teams, the runs-per-defensive-inning ratio is again used. This process is repeated until all ties have been broken.

Consolation Games (Tuesday, August 10)

Huntsville Eastern (Alabama) 14, Spring Hill (Tennessee) 0 (4 innings)
SYA East (Virginia) 9, Carolina Forest (South Carolina) 0

Southeastern Region Tournament Semifinals (Wednesday, August 11)

Columbus Northern (Georgia) 9, Ripley (West Virginia) 3
Viera/Suntree (Florida) 3, Winston-Salem National (North Carolina) 2

Southeastern Region Tournament Championship Game (Friday, August 13)

Columbus Northern (Georgia) 9, Viera/Suntree (Florida) 2 (TITLE)

"This is a trend," said the veteran Columbus Northern (Georgia) Little League manager Randy Morris after his team had moved to within one game of its second trip to the Little League World Series in five years. "And I am not really crazy about it."

Morris wasn't protesting his team's advance toward Little League Baseball's annual showcase event, but rather how his team had progressed to the doorstep of South Williamsport. A one-run victory over South Carolina in their opening round game at the region tournament. Rallying from four runs down in the fifth inning against the Alabama state champions. Trailing North Carolina 2-0 entering the sixth, before tying and later winning the game in extra innings. And then in the semifinal round encounter, trailing Ripley (West Virginia) Little League by a 3-2 score entering the bottom of the fifth inning before hanging a seven-run rally on the board and winning 9-3.

Columbus Northern was undefeated, but their path to the Southeastern Region championship game was anything but easy.

"We seem to like that," said the Georgia manager of his team's penchant for mid-game deficits. "We've done that a lot for whatever reason. I can't figure out why (but) so far we've overcome it."

Despite the trend -- and the fact that a powerful Viera/Suntree (Melbourne, Florida) Little League team that had yet to trail in any of its region tournament games stood between Northern and a trip to South Williamsport -- Morris liked his team's chances in the region championship game.

"We've got our number one guy," said Morris, "and he's got 85 pitches."

Columbus hurler Jacob Pate made the most of his pitches, and did his part to continue a different trend: another Georgia league was headed to the Little League World Series.

Pate threw 5-2/3 innings of three-hit ball, striking out eight and allowing just three hits, and Columbus Northern once again used a late-inning offensive push to assert control. Northern broke open a one-run game with seven runs in the final two innings, and defeated Viera/Suntree, 9-2, to win the Southeastern Region tournament. Columbus Northern became the fourth Georgia league to win the Southeastern Region in a five-year span.

Northern's late inning offense coincided with the departure of Florida starter Michael Pineda. The right-hander struck out ten Georgia hitters in the game's first four innings, and held Columbus to just two runs, but early control issues helped to accelerate his pitch count and forced Pineda to switch positions.

"We were glad to get him out," said Morris. "We didn't have too many good at-bats early, but he had a lot to do with that."

Northern's late inning flurry paralleled the team's approach throughout the regional. In the first three innings of its five region tournament games, the Georgia champions batted a meager .161 as a team, and scored just six runs. In the latter half of their contests, though, Northern's offense heated up: the team's collective batting average in the fourth inning or later was .419, and Northern outscored its opponents by a 29-6 margin. Northern scored multiple runs in an inning just once in the first half of its contests, but did so seven times in the latter stages of its games.

Georgia scratched for single runs in the first and fourth innings of its championship game win. Pineda struck out the side in the first inning, but also walked four batters in a 37-pitch frame that contributed heavily to his early brush with pitch count limits. In the fourth, leadoff hitter Blake Hicks singled home Jack Lang with the game's second run.

Northern pulled away in the fifth. Brandon Pugh singled and Knox Carter walked to open the inning. After a pitching change, Kobie Buglioli doubled home both runners before later scoring on a passed ball. In the sixth, Pate singled home a run, Hicks scored on a passed ball, then Carter and Buglioli each delivered run-scoring doubles.

"They all got some confidence once we started hitting," said Morris of his teams' late inning rallies. "We kept fighting and got it done. I couldn't be more proud of these kids."

Viera/Suntree countered Northern's offense with Matthew Prater's home run in the fourth and a later shot from Pineda, but both blasts came with the bases empty as Pate minimized the damage from an offense that had clubbed nine home runs in its prior four games.

"Pate is the real deal," said Florida manager Mark Muzzi. "He can bring it."

"He's the guy we wanted to have the ball," concurred Morris. "I didn't know if we'd score enough runs or not, but I knew they wouldn't get many."

Northern's wire-to-wire lead in the title game was a more comfortable setting than the team experienced in its semifinal round contest, when the Georgia champions needed a rally in the fifth inning to overcome West Virginia's Ripley Little League, 7-3. Ripley grabbed a 3-2 lead in the second inning on Christopher Jordan's two-run double, and carried that advantage into the fifth as pitcher Ethan Stepp escaped a series of jams despite allowing multiple baserunners in three of the game's first four innings. He stranded two baserunners with a pair of strikeouts in the third, and stranded two more with an inning-ending double play in the fourth.

"The way we approached the bottom of the fifth, especially with (Hicks coming up), is I wanted a groundout from him and Pate in about five pitches," explained Ripley manager Chris Jordan, who hoped to minimize Stepp's pitch count. "I turned to my coach... and I said 'if they score in this inning, we're in trouble. If we get out of this inning, we got them."

Rather than the hoped-for groundout, Pate deposited the inning's second pitch over the right center field fence to tie the game, and the next six Northern hitters all reached base as the Georgians opened up a 6-3 lead before the inning's first out was recorded. Pate and Pugh drew walks, and Pate scored as Carter reached on a fielder's choice. Buglioli singled home another run, and Cason Sizemore reached on an error that plated another run. Hicks then capped the rally with a three-run double.

The win gave Columbus its third come-from-behind win in as many games. Northern's first rally was also its biggest, when the Georgians responded to a six-run burst by Huntsville Eastern (Alabama) Little League with a four-spot of its own in the fifth inning of an 8-7 victory.

"I just challenged 'em," said Morris of his message after Huntsville moved into the lead. "I said 'guys, you can lay down and roll over, or you can take this thing one bat at a time."

Carter, who led off the bottom of the frame, sparked the rally with a long home run on the second pitch he saw. Buglioli followed with a single, and Huntsville recorded a pair of outs before two infield errors extended the inning. Hicks and Pugh followed with run-scoring singles that ultimately tied the game before Sizemore's seventh inning single plated Jack Tanner with the winning run.

"We got the ground balls," said Huntsville manager Tom Davis of Northern's fifth inning rally. "We should have been out of the inning."

"Knox's home run, that was huge," said Morris of the blow that led off the frame. "That happened, and it kind of set the tone. We kind of fed off that some."

The next day, Northern pushed across a pair of runs in the top of the sixth to force extra innings in what became a 7-2 victory over Winston-Salem National (North Carolina) Little League. Troy Gilliland and Sizemore each drove in runs in the sixth before a Hicks home run and Buglioli's three-run triple iced the win in the seventh.

"That's the thing with this team," said Morris during his team's pool play comebacks. "Everybody on this team contributes."

While Northern was tested throughout the tournament, Viera/Suntree breezed through pool competition before pushing past Winston-Salem National, 3-2, in the semifinal round. The North Carolina champions stranded baserunners in every inning, including six in scoring position, and Viera/Suntree took the lead for good on Vincent Benvenuto's two-run single in the fourth inning. After smashing nine home runs during pool competition -- and outscoring its opponents by a 22-1 margin -- the Florida winners were homerless and relied on small ball in the semifinal round win.

"We work all the time on the little things, such as bunting, and (against North Carolina) it paid off" explained Muzzi. "I think we had two base hits off of bunts, and they weren't from kids that you would really expect to be bunting. We have prepared for winning games without hitting home runs, and (this) was a perfect example of that."

Viera/Suntree had slammed five home runs in a 14-1 victory over Ripley in their opener, and three more in a 5-0 victory over Spring Hill (Tennessee) in its final pool contest. In between, three Viera/Suntree pitchers -- Pineda, Anthony Castagnaro, and Sebastian Samuels combined to no-hit Virginia's SYA East Little League, 4-0.

"We've never had a no-hitter before," noted Muzzi. "Our pitching and defense were awesome as usual. We didn't hit like we would like, but they threw a guy who kept us off-balance."

Five days later, it was Pate who kept the Floridians off-balance, as Northern captured a berth in the Little League World Series.

"I think that this is as good of a team as I have coached," Morris had noted on the eve of the region tournament. "We have all twelve kids contributing. Even the kids who don't start, they play just as well and could be starters on most other teams."

Northern ultimately needed every one of those contributions in a tournament where comfortable leads were at a premium. The Georgia champions went on to win their first two games at the Little League World Series, and finished as the runner-up in their pool to eventual U.S. champion Waipio Little League (Waipahu, Hawaii).

Linescores:

Pool Play Game 1	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8		R	H	E
Ripley (West Virginia)	0	0	0	1	0					1	4	0
Viera/Suntree (Florida)	1	1	4	0	8					14	12	0
Pool Play Game 2
Carolina Forest (South Carolina)	0	0	0	1	0	0				1	3	1
Columbus Northern (Georgia)	1	0	1	0	0	x				2	3	0
Pool Play Game 3
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina)	0	0	2	2	0	0				4	5	1
Huntsville Eastern (Alabama)	0	0	3	0	0	0				3	3	3
Pool Play Game 4
SYA East (Virginia)	4	2	7	5						18	18	0
Spring Hill (Tennessee)	1	0	0	0						1	1	3
Pool Play Game 5
Huntsville Eastern (Alabama)	0	0	1	0	6	0				7	13	4
Columbus Northern (Georgia)	0	1	0	2	4	1				8	13	1
Pool Play Game 6
SYA East (Virginia)	0	0	0	0	0	0				0	0	0
Viera/Suntree (Florida)	0	0	4	0	0	x				4	4	0
Pool Play Game 7
Ripley (West Virginia)	0	0	0	1	1	1	3	5		11	13	7
Spring Hill (Tennessee)	2	0	0	0	0	1	3	0		6	8	3
Pool Play Game 8
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina)	1	2	1	4	6					14	15	2
Carolina Forest (South Carolina)	0	1	1	0	0					2	7	3
Pool Play Game 9
Spring Hill (Tennessee)	0	0	0	0	0	0				0	7	1
Viera/Suntree (Florida)	1	1	1	2	0	x				5	6	2
Pool Play Game 10
Huntsville Eastern (Alabama)	0	0	4	0	1	5				10	9	0
Carolina Forest (South Carolina)	0	1	0	0	2	0				3	8	2
Pool Play Game 11
Ripley (West Virginia)	0	0	2	0	0	1				3	2	2
SYA East (Virginia)	1	0	0	0	0	1				2	6	1
Pool Play Game 12
Columbus Northern (Georgia)	0	0	0	0	0	2	5			7	9	0
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina)	2	0	0	0	0	0	1			3	4	3
Consolation Game
Huntsville Eastern (Alabama)	3	2	0	9						14	11	0
Spring Hill (Tennessee)	0	0	0	0						0	3	0
Consolation Game
SYA East (Virginia)	1	0	2	3	1	2				9	9	1
Carolina Forest (South Carolina)	0	0	0	0	0	0				0	2	1
Semifinal Round
Ripley (West Virginia)	1	2	0	0	0	0				3	6	4
Columbus Northern (Georgia)	2	0	0	0	7	x				9	6	0
Semifinal Round
Winston-Salem National (North Carolina)	0	0	1	0	1	0				2	6	1
Viera/Suntree (Florida)	0	0	1	2	0	x				3	9	2
Championship Game
Columbus Northern (Georgia)	1	0	0	1	3	4				9	9	0
Viera/Suntree (Florida)	0	0	0	1	1	0				2	3	0

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