Kenosha Kings Win Langsdorf League Championship

Someone will be updating the Kenosha Kings website, adding a team photo that shows the smiling guys from the 2010 team holding up four fingers behind the trophy that goes to the Langsdorf League playoff champions.

Like it read in block letters on their jerseys, the Kings are kings … for the fourth straight season.

The Kings took advantage of a relatively short distance to the left field fence to hit four home runs — two by second baseman Jason Dennis — and Eric Schumacher allowed one run in 4 2/3 innings of relief as the Kings beat the West Allis Nationals, 7-5, at New Berlin West High School on Saturday in the final game of the best-of-three championship series.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s the first one or the fifth one,” said Kings manager Tim Pulizzano, whose 2006 team won the Wisconsin State League championship. “And this (West Allis) team, what a battle. We had a heck of a series against them.”

That’s for sure. The Kings, who lost all three regular-season meetings with the Nationals, won the opener of the playoff, 2-1 in 10 innings innings. They had a 6-3 lead at Simmons going to the seventh in the second game but could not seal the deal.

They did in the cozy confines at New Berlin West, where it is 300 feet down the line in left, 354 to the power alley, 370 to straightaway center, 358 to right-center and 310 down the line in right. All four home runs went to left.

Left fielder Kyle Frye gave the Kings (32-19) the lead for good with a two-run home run in the fourth, his third of the season, which gave him a team-high 43 RBIs. Center fielder Paul Pulera, who made two excellent defensive plays, led off the fifth with a solo home run (his first). Dennis followed with his second of the game — and season — to make it 7-3. Right fielder Andrew Highland added a two-run double to left-center in the second as the Kings capitalized on two walks.

Schumacher (4-2), who pitched four shutout innings and was the winner in the 2-1 game, was named the most valuable player of the playoffs. He set down the last eight Nationals (20-10) without allowing a ball to be hit out of the infield.

Schumacher allowed two hits, but one of them turned out to be OK. Pulera, who made a terrific diving catch to end the fourth, threw out a runner trying to go from first to third on a run-scoring single in the sixth.

Pulera has been having a problem with his right foot. With the season is over, he can finally get it checked out.

“When you’re in the moment you just kind of go with it, and then afterward you’re like (ouch),” said Pulera, a UW-Parkside player to be who has played on all four Langsdorf champs.

Story and Photo by: Kenosha News