Hinsdale Little League players and team supporters celebrate after the 8-7 win over Jasper, Indiana, that qualified Hinsdale into the Little League World Series.
Courtesy of Hinsdale Little League
The Hinsdale team that will take the diamond Friday at the Little League Baseball World Series has not lost a game in three years.
Going 13-0 this season after winning the Great Lakes Region in a rare close 8-7 decision against Jasper, Indiana, on Aug. 7, these Hinsdale 12-year-olds have outscored their opponents 405-25 since they teamed up when they were 10.
They’re friends off the field and teammates in other sports. They cruise the neighborhood on their bikes like kids have forever.
“They’re just great buddies,” Hinsdale coach Chad Wanless said.
“They play for each other. They love the game, and they’re having a ton of fun on this journey,” said Wanless, who coaches them with Damon Phelan and Luke Goodwin.
The journey — Hinsdale’s first time at the Little League World Series — continues at 2 p.m. Friday, Aug. 16, at the world-famous location, Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
Receiving a first-round bye, Hinsdale plays the winner of Wednesday’s game between Salem, New Hampshire, and Wailuku, Hawaii — who came out of the New England and West regionals, respectively.
The series is a double-elimination tournament played Wednesday through Aug. 25 on two fields at the Little League International Complex. It pits the winner of 10 United States regionals against the best of 10 international teams. The games can be watched on ESPN platforms.
In 2023, El Segundo, California, defeated Curacao 6-5 to win the championship.
The Hinsdale Little League team members are Shane Behar, Colin Boots, Ethan Chan, Kellan Goodwin, Dane Graham, Michael Kipnis, Jimmy Macri, Emiliano Nepomuceno, Dillon Phelan, Freddie Sackley, Alex Vivanco, and Grant Wanless.
“They are a very humble group of kids,” said Wendy Macri, a Hinsdale Little League board member and its director of sponsorships and communications.
“They expect a lot from themselves,” she said. “But they work hard for it. They had an expectation to win state because they had the last two years. But I don’t think they ever thought in their wildest dreams that this would be a reality, going to the Little League World Series.”
It took all Hinsdale had to survive Jasper at the Great Lakes regional in Whitestown, Indiana.
Down to one last strike and trailing Indiana 7-6 in the bottom of the sixth inning, Kipnis’ double scored Goodwin to send the game into extra innings.
Grant Wanless, who came on in relief to pitch out of a sixth-inning jam, kept Indiana scoreless in the seventh and eighth innings.
In the bottom of the eighth, Vivanco drilled the ball down the right field line to score Chan from second for the victory.
Hitting, pitching, defense, speed — Hinsdale has it.
“I feel like on any given day, we’ve got a chance to be really good in any of those aspects and can win games with any of those facets,” Chad Wanless said.
In addition to playing winning baseball, Wanless said Hinsdale’s goal is to capture the joy of being one of 20 teams still playing out of the 5,000 that entered the playoffs six weeks ago.
“This trip is no longer about wins or losses,” said Wanless, who praised the community support for the ballclub.
“Honestly, our biggest goal as coaches is to make sure they have fun,” he said. “They’ve worked so hard to get here.
“We’ll get serious at practice so that, during the games, we let loose, put a smile on our face, trust the work we’ve put in, and go out there and have fun,” he said.