The 2012 Nationwide Conference USSSA season is set to open this Friday night March 30th at the Big League Dreams park in Las Vegas, Nevada. First game is 5:40 PM Pacific time.
31 teams from 11 different states including 13 Conference teams and a breakout of:
3 Major
3 A
7 B
6 C
11 D
1 E
Laser Vision gets the #1 seed. This tournament features teams #2 through #5 in the pre-season rankings. Only #1 Resmondo will not be there out of the top teams. Team 454 has to play their second game at 8 AM when everyone else plays at 10:40 AM considering they are the #4 seed and it would be a long day for any team if they have success. But these are minor issues and it isn’t easy to make everyone happy.
In the top half of the bracket an early SBS/Combat vs West Coast Doerflinger/Easton game will be a good one.
In the 2nd part of the bracket I’ll go with Sonny’s over a good Baugh Ford team and then a great battle of ‘A’ teams with Sonny’s going against Team 454. This will be a good test for Sonny’s who dominated western conference events last year matched against the reigning ‘A’ World Champs, and the game is scheduled for Fenway Park no less. 454 will have to be the favorite there.
In the 3rd part of the bracket an early match between Line Drive Sportz/SSS Softball and the new ‘A’ team Demarini/FamousSports.com will be an interesting one on Saturday morning. Line Drive has the giant killer reputation from a year ago and have re-tooled and look to be a great defensive team. It will take Line Drive in an upset although if its windy like the weather says then Demarini may be able to out power them. Nordkap will look to beat Line Drive to make the final 4.
In the last part of the bracket, a Saturday matchup between class ‘B’ titans “4 The Fallen”/Easton/3n2 and Down2Earth.com/SBC/Worth could be the best matchup of a stacked 2nd round of the tournament. “4 The Fallen” will try to rally around their new pickup Denny Crine and their military veteran based team has built in chemistry and hustle. D2E has been playing softball all winter long and re-tooled a top ‘B’ team from a year ago and are ready to start the season with a bang.
The local teams which could provide some upsets are Classic Glass, MaddSkills, AZM, and Custom Truck. The problem is those 4 teams play each other in the first round. It will also be interesting to see how ABRA from Utah does. They won the 216 team ‘D’ World last year by going 11-1 and have moved up to ‘C’.
About USSSA:
The United States Specialty Sports Association (USSSA), headquartered in Osceola County, Florida, USSSA is the World’s Largest Multi-sport Athletic Organization. Founded in 1968, USSSA has grown to over 3.7 million participants, competing in 13 nationally sanctioned sports including Baseball, Fastpitch, Slow Pitch, Karate, Basketball, Soccer and more! For more information on USSSA and to register your team visit USSSA.com. Also be sure to visit USSSAToday.com for the latest USSSA News!
