Quincy 13-year-old Babe Ruth All-Stars take aim at New England crown in Connecticut

Rick Beach likes everything about his Babe Ruth Baseball 13-year-old All-Stars.

OK, almost everything.

"It's just a great group of kids," he said. "Good parents, good kids."

"The sad thing," he added with a laugh, "is that they all won't come to Quincy" for high school.

Beach spends his spring coaching the Quincy High varsity team, but his summers are devoted to the younger kids. This summer the kids have been very good.

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Beach's Quincy team set up shop in Trumbull, Connecticut, on Thursday afternoon to begin preparing for what they hope is a lengthy stay at the eight-team New England Regional.

Quincy is in Pool B and has round-robin games scheduled for Friday (vs. Three Corners, Vermont, at 4 p.m.), Saturday (vs. Tri-County, Maine, at 10 a.m.) and Sunday (vs. Waterford, Connecticut, at 10 a.m.). Pool A features host Trumbull, plus teams from Pittsfield; Keene, New Hampshire; and North Providence/Smithfield, Rhode Island.

The Pool A and Pool B winners get byes into the semifinals, while the second- and third-place teams from each pool play crossover quarterfinals.

The New England champ earns a ticket to the Babe Ruth World Series in Glen Allen, Virginia, Aug. 10-20.

Is the excitement building?

"Oh, yeah," Beach said. "Everybody's rolling in (to the hotel) now. They're all excited. They can't wait for (Friday)."

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Quincy advanced to the New England tournament by winning the EMass crown, notching wins over Milton (12-4), Taunton (8-7 in a game spread over two days due to weather), Dedham (5-2) and Braintree (7-5).

"Honestly, they're playing so well," Beach said. "Braintree threw this big lefty against us (in the final at Adams Field in Quincy), and he was really good. But there's a pitch count; once you get to 95 you're out, and we got him out in the fifth inning. We were losing 3-1 going into the fifth and then we put up five runs in the fifth to go up 6-3."

Quincy's pitching staff goes five deep with Nick Ambroult, Emmet Allen, Henry Gates, Dylan McCole and Joe Carroll. "I basically rotate those five guys," Beach said. "They throw strikes. And we play good defense."

Getting center fielder Malcolm McMorrow back after he missed a month and a half with a foot injury has been a boost to the defense. McMorrow returned to the lineup for the EMass final against Braintree, "which was a difference-maker," Beach said, "because he ended up catching the first out of the game and the last out of the game."

Beach's son Ryan is the catcher and has been instrumental in short-circuiting opponents' running games.

The elder Beach is relishing this father-son time since he's been down this road before.

"It's awesome," he said. "I got to do it with my older son Tyler, and we ended up winning two state championships (at the 14- and 16-year-old levels). (Ryan) got dragged to all the fields when he was little. All the (youth and high school) fields, all the college baseball games when Tyler was playing (as a middle infielder at Westfield State).

"Now he gets to do it himself. He works so hard. He hits off the tee every day in the garage. He had the older brother (to look up to) and so he wants to be better than his older brother."

As for Quincy's lineup, watch out for slugger Ayden McElhiney. "When he gets ahold of them he hits them far," Beach said. "And for a big kid he runs very well. He's very deceiving (on the basepaths)."

"We're very fundamentally sound," Beach said of Quincy's approach. "Sometimes we strike out too much, but this is 13-year-old baseball and curveballs are in effect now. So that changes things.

"We steal a lot. We get on, we steal, we play some small ball. Whatever it takes. We shake it up."

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Quincy Babe Ruth 13-year-old All-Stars aiming for New England title