CHAFFEE JR. LEGION TEAM IS IN A ZONE

Manager Joe Rice figures it took a big late-inning deficit last week to finally wake up the Chaffee Junior American Legion baseball team.

Chaffee, highly-touted throughout the season, trailed host Sikeston 8-3 entering the seventh and final inning of a second-round game in the District 14 Tournament.

But Chaffee rallied for six runs to claim a pulsating 9-8 victory and the squad went on to roll to the district title, going undefeated and outscoring the opposition 41-19 overall.

By virtue of winning the district tourney, Chaffee qualified for the four-team Zone Tournament that begins today at Ballwin in the St. Louis area

The zone winner earns a berth in the state tourney.

Chaffee will face Manchester at 5:30 p.m. in the opening round of the double-elimination event. If Chaffee wins today, it will be play at 5:30 p.m. Friday. If it loses today, it will play at 1 p.m. Friday. The finals are set for 1 p.m. Saturday.

"I thought we had a very good (district) tournament, after the sixth inning of the Sikeston game," said Rice, whose squad has a 23-9 record. "Sikeston really gave us a wakeup call. We were really lucky to get by them.

"That may well have been the turning point for this ballclub to become mentally tough, to realize what it takes to win, and I told them that afterward."

Rice acknowledged that Chaffee has had something of an up-and-down season but appears to be coming around at just the right time.

"We were kind of up and down, but I think we're peaking at the right time now," he said. "In the first games of doubleheaders, we were very good, then in second games, it was almost like `oh well, we've beat these guys already', and we just relaxed.

"Going into the season, I expected us to be strong. We are very deep in pitching, our hitting is obviously good, our defense is strong and we have a good bench."

Chaffee, which features several players who were key performers for local high school varsity teams in the spring, has a team batting average of .338, with 10 players batting better than .300.

Justin Simpher leads the way at .441, followed by John O'Rourke at .396 and Travis Hanback at .382.

Perry Rice is batting .364, followed by Matt Stroup (.361), Adam Rainey (.342), Todd Friend (.337), Rocky Portel (.326), Lance Dohogne (.313) and Andrew Estes (.306).

Friend has four home runs to lead the way in that department while O'Rourke has homered three times and Simpher has two homers.

In the pitching department, Simpher leads the way with an 8-2 record while Stroup is 5-2 and has struck out 92 batters in 59 2/3 innings. O'Rourke has a 4-3 record while Erin Cantrell and Jarad Schenimann are each 2-0 and several other hurlers have also contributed.

"We've got a lot of guys who can pitch and I think that has paid off for us," Rice said.

Rice expects quite a battle in the zone tourney and he believes Chaffee will have to step up its play even more in order to capture the title.

"I like the way we're playing but I feel like we'll have to take it up a notch to win the zone," he said. "All the teams will be very good."