Throw in Vulcan, Hermanaville, Waucedah....heck, even Powers and Spalding.
You still won't come close to the size of Little League towns that the Norway 10-11 boys faced at the state tournament in West Branch this weekend.
Norway lost to Birmingham from Detroit's northern suburbs, 3-0, Monday night, after losing to Taylor from Detroit's "downriver" suburbs 10-0 on Saturday. The only team the boys played from a small town was Richmond, and Norway won that game, 7-6.
"Birmingham had outscored it two previous opponents by a combined score of 36-6.," wrote Norway Manager Mike Snyder. "We had chances throughout the game but was not able to score any runs."
Norway started Hunter Riley on the mound. Riley threw a three hit complete game, striking out eight batters and walking just one. Unfortunately for Riley and Norway, two of the three hits that Birmingham got were home runs.
Landen Kaldor led Norway with two hits, Ben Snyder had a double, and Bret Turini and Anthony Hansen each had singles.
Riley also started on the mound for Norway against Taylor and pitched two scoreless innings. But Taylor scored four runs in the third inning and four more in the fourth to win, 10-0.
Trey Doda, David Loomis and Carter Holle recorded the only hits for Norway.
Norway bounced back with a 7-6 win over Richmond on Sunday.
Doda, Riley, Kaldor and Snyder all had two hits apiece. Doda scored three runs.
Hansen was the starting pitcher. He pitched 3 2/3 innings, fanning five. Snyder came on in relief and finished the game with 2 1/3 innings, fanning two.
The game was tied 4-4 in the top of the fifth when Richmond scored two runs to take a 6-4 lead and was threatening to add more. With runners on first and second and two outs Carter Holle for Norway made a leaping catch in deep right field to end the inning.
The catch saved two runs. Norway came back in the bottom of the fifth with three runs to take the 7-6 lead. In that inning, Riley had a double, Kaldor, Snyder and Dalton Hanchek all had singles.
The tournament had been delayed by heavy rains that wiped out all of Friday's games.
