Fairfield American 10-Year-Old All-Stars Win State Title

The Fairfield American 9- 10-year-old All-Stars picked a good year to go on a summer run, which has included district,  sectional and state championships.

In years' past,  the season ended for this age group at the state level, but now there is more baseball to be played.  Starting Saturday, the squad will compete in the inagural East Region Invitational in Cranston, Rhode Island.

The survivor there will then go on to play the Mid-Atlantic Regional winner, which will be the final game of the season, as there is no World Series for this division.

Fairfield American earned the right to go to Rhode Island by sweeping Waterford this past weekend in a two-out-of-three series for the state title at Stamford Springdale. The locals won by scores of 22-7 and 9-2.

The players on the team are: Ryan Meury, Biagio Paoletta, Will Lucas, Matt Kubel, Henrik Dejounge. Matty Clarkin, Drew McAvey, Matt Landry, Chris Meyers, Patrick Steed, Sean Lynch and Daniel Kiernan.

The success in Stamford improved Fairfield American's record to 14-1 during the postseason. Earlier, it defeated  Fairfield National (6-4) to win the District two title, then handled Shelton National (14-3) to capture the section one crown.

Coach Bill Meury says his players take the field with a disciplined and professional approach while not taking themselves too seriously.

"First and foremost, it's a modest group of kids," Meury said. "They have had an awful lot of success, but they're very understated in terms of how they handle things."

Fairfield American hit four home runs in the two victories over Waterford.

"There's definitely some pop in the lineup," Meury added. "We have a few kids who can hit the ball out of the park. It's doesn't happen often, but when it does, it certainly is helpful."

Meury won't be with his team through the middle of the week. After the clinching win over Waterford, he caught a red eye flight out of JFK on Sunday night at 11:30 for a business trip to Budapest, of all places. Twelve hours later, counting a layover in Paris, he arrived in Hungary.

But fear not. He'll be back in Connecticut on Thursday and travel with the team up to Rhode Island on Friday. Fairfield American opens against Maine on Saturday at 1 p.m.

Games will follow on Sunday (New Hampshire) and next Tuesday (Massachusetts) and Thursday (Rhode Island). The New England championship game is set for August 6 at 5 p.m.

The success of the 9-and 10-year-old All-Stars is part of a remarkable run for all of Fairfield American's district teams this summer.

The 12-year-old team is 12-0 during the postseason and will take on Farmington on Wednesday in the section one championship game.

The 11-year-old team is 10-0 and plays for the section one title on Wednesday (6 p.m.) against East Haven at Stamford's Scalzi Park.

That's a combined 36-1, and it's hard to imagine any town in the state doing better.