The Clovis Nighthawks, a 19 and under travel baseball team that plays under the likeness of the American Legion Post 147 play for a state championship for the second year in a row. This team, composed of student-athletes from Clovis area high schools, had to win a best of five series against a Madera area team, the “Madtown Merchants” this past weekend of July 13th-15th.
With only four out of fourteen returners to the Clovis Nighthawks, the team will now travel on to UCLA’s Jackie Robinson Stadium to play in the state championship. Here they play other district winning teams on July 19th-24th for the chance to be crowned state champions.
The Clovis Nighthawks have players officially listed from Buchanan High School, Clovis High School, and Clovis West High School alongside Washington Union and San Joaquin Memorial.
The team finished in second place last year to state champion Petaluma.
Update:
The Nighthawks played in the State Tournament held at UCLA’s Jackie Robinson Stadium over the weekend of July 20-24th.
Each American Legion team represented a branch of the American Military, and this year, the Clovis Nighthawks were assigned the Army as their branch. In their first game of the State tournament, they lost to last year’s State Champions, Petaluma by a score of 6-2.
The next day, playing under the threat of elimination, the Nighthawks won by a score of 6-0 against the Post 492 Panthers out of San Diego. The Nighthawks would again win under the threat of being eliminated against the Post 364 Tomcats of West Hills High School in Santee, California. This game was a lopsided score of 11-0.
Unfortunately for the Post 147 Nighthawks, their winning streak would end on Sunday, just missing out on a championship game the following Monday. They lost their final game of the season by a score of 5-3 to the El Segundo Blues out of El Segundo.
Two teams will represent California in the Regionals, the State Champions Yuba City Post 705 and host city of the Regional Tournament, the Fairfield Expos.