Los Gatos Weekly-Times

Los Gatos baseball standout Casey Neale (right) helps hold the trophy high after the Northern California Angels had won the championship at the AAU National Championships. Neale ripped a two-run homer in the title game.

Angels win national crown

LG's Neale homers in the title game

By Dick Sparrer

It was just a year ago that Casey Neale's home runs were flying out of the park at the Los Gatos Pony League field at Fisher Middle School.

Well, Neale was homering again this summer. But not at Fisher. Neale was driving it out of the yard in the AAU National Championships in Sarasota, Fla.

Neale was a member of the Angels, a 15-year-old select team from Northern California, and he helped the local all-stars win the national championship.

Neale launched a 375-foot, two-run homer to help the Angels to a 7-4 win over the East Cobb Angels of Atlanta, Ga., in the tournament title game.

The count was full when Neale pounded the high, inside pitch over the left field fence.

"That was probably the farthest home run I ever hit," Neale told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune after the game. "It was a great feeling, something I will always cherish."

The win was the ninth straight for the Angels. Earlier the same day, the NorCal 'stars had upset the title-favorite Storm of Southern California 8-7 to advance to the finals.

The Angels finished atop a 43-team field to win the national championship. Teams from coast-to-coast played in the rugged tourney.

The locals rolled through the tourney with wins over the Tennessee Buzz (10-0), Utah Murray Shockers (15-0), Dallas Hurricanes (15-4), Lightning Baseball of New England (8-7), Connecticutt (12-10), Des Moines Outlaws (8-6) and Ohio Servall Shockers (16-8) before beating the Storm in the semifinals and the Astros in the title game.

Neale was just one of many talented local players on the squad coached by Rob Bruno. Josh Kreuzer and Jeremy Roulin of Leigh, Chris Russo of Bellarmine, Dustin Hahn of St. Francis, Andrew Hansen of Santa Clara and Casey McGehee of Soquel were other top players from the area on the team that includes players from Redding to Soquel.

McGehee and teammates Chris Carter and Chad Ross were members of the NorCal squad picked to the AAU National Tournament team.

Neale was one of the many local players to have won special honors in the high school season last spring. The Los Gatos freshman was named the frosh-soph most valuable player in the De Anza Division of the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League.

Kreuzer and Roulin both played for the varsity team at Leigh, and each won top league honors. Kreuzer was picked the sophomore of the year in the Santa Teresa Division of the Blossom Valley Athletic League and Roulin was selected the freshman of the year.

Russo was named the Central Coast Section freshman of the year after an outstanding season for the Bells.

For Bruno, the championship was nothing new. The veteran baseball coach has now taken teams to two AAU national championships. He has also guided clubs to the gold and silver at the AAU Junior Olympics, and to a state Connie Mack championship.

But he has high praise for this year's squad.

"This team is as good as the 1992 AAU national championship team we had," he told the Herald-Tribune. And that is indeed high praise, considering that former Bellarmine Pat Burrell was a member of that team. Burrell went on to star at Miami and was the No. 1 pick in the professional baseball draft this year.

[ Back to Contents Page | Los Gatos Weekly-Times Home Page | Archives ]