It seems to me that the ECC softball championship is a lot more fun than baseball.
Why?
The softball championship truly is a title game and the games tend to be much closer. That's probably because the best pitchers can pitch.
Take for example the action on Thursday.
St. Bernard, a Small team, took Bacon, a Medium team, to eight innings before losing 2-0. Lyman, a Small team, hung right in there with the Largest of them all before losing to NFA 2-1.
The coaches are into it, the players are into it and they are highly competitive, intense games and it seems to mean a little more.
Baseball coaches tend to look at the ECC tournament as more of a hinderance than a help. You may see Matt Harvey or Rob Bono early but you won't see them in the championship game because it's too close to the start of the state tournament. The championship game tonight will feature Waterford's number three starting pitcher against Fitch's number four. All the players will play, but the emphasis is clearly on what takes place next week not what is happening on the field at ECSU tonight.
That being said, I still think tonight's Waterford-Fitch game is going to be a good one to watch. Not often do you get to see a host of Division I college players-to-be on the same field against one another.
Make your choice, though, because the NFA-Griswold game shapes up to be one of those close, fast, well played softball championship games in Griswold.
Lacrosse fans also get a choice tonight as East Lyme hosts NFA in the ECC girls title match at 5 p.m. and Ledyard in the boys championship at 7 p.m. East Lyme the large favorite in both those games.