MERIDIAN - When the 11U Worland Baseball traveled to the Cal Ripken Northwest Regional Tournament in Meridian, Idaho, on July 21-22, the goal, along with winning the championship, was to notch at least one win. This was the third consecutive trip to the Northwest Regional for the program and in the previous two trips they returned home without a win.

Battling against seven other high-caliber teams for the championship, Worland was locked in on their goals. The tournament was setup by splitting the eight teams into two groups of four. The first two days of the tournament were group play, after group play concluded the top two teams from each group advanced into bracket play for a chance at the championship.

Worland would have four tries at grabbing their first Northwest Regional win in program history.

Worland's first opponent Thursday morning was Willamette Valley and the game went as roughly as one could imagine by losing 23-0. Willamette Valley would go on to win the regional tournament.

Not wanting the first game to be a regular occurrence, Worland regrouped and showed the mental toughness needed for a successful program. Against Langley, Worland was much sharper on the field and held a 1-0 lead at the top of the third inning but Langley took the lead in the fourth inning. It came down to the final inning, trailing 5-2 with runners in scoring position Worland had their shot, unfortunately they couldn't capitalize.

Having dropped their first two games Worland was down to their final two tries. They even had an outside shot to break into bracket play, but needed to win both games on Friday.

First up was Whitefish, Worland took a 4-3 lead going into the bottom of the fourth but Whitefish answered scoring six runs, taking a 9-4 lead. In the final inning Worland was threatening to trim the lead, again, they weren't able to get runners across home plate, dropping their third game 9-4.

Eliminated from bracket play Worland was still determined to walk away from Meridian with one victory. Middleton was the final opponent and the game did not start well for Worland as they allowed 10 runs in the first inning. After that inning Worland's defense shaped up and held Middleton scoreless the remainder of the game. While the defense improved, Worland's bats had a hard time mustering runs. The team was only able to produce one more run and lost to Middleton by a score of 10-1.

While the team fell short on their goals, manager Jerry Leyva was proud of his team and all they achieved this season. "We made a huge jump this season," said Leyva, "We didn't accomplish our goal of winning a regional game but the boys competed better than we have before. We showed we can play. We were right in games two games and had the potential to go 2-2."

Next season manager Leyva said the team will look to practice more during the winter. The program purchased an indoor mound to work on pitching during the winter. "We'll start practicing earlier in the winter and with the indoor mound we'll work on pitching as well," said Leyva, "We'll also focus on playing a full six innings and finishing games."