NUTS - Niamey teams win it all!
This year, NUTS (Niamey Universal Tournament of Softball) was an exciting, edge-of-your-seat, fun tournament to watch. While there were only three competitive teams, there were eight social teams, including the Comets, an all-girls team from Sahel Academy.
As usual, games were played simultaneously at the Rec Center and Sahel Academy. At Sahel Academy, snacks were sold at the ‘Snack Shack, a booth set up by the Sahel Academy Stucco and senior class. Some of the many goodies for sale were cotton candy, funnel cakes, brownies, popsicles, tampicos, cookies, hot-dogs, brochettes, the best quesadillas in town, coke, sprite, fanta, and tonic.
Some of the social games were really fun and exciting to watch. The best games to watch were the games between the Cotonou Zemis and the Sahel Suns. In their first game, at the bottom of the 3rd inning, the Zemis were up 12-6. By the end of the 5th inning, Sahel was back in the game. In the last inning Sahel scored 2 run to give the Suns a 14-13 lead over the Zemis; but in the bottom of the inning, the Zemis got 1 run to tie up the game 14 all. In the semi-finals game between these 2 teams, the Suns came alive and showed their fielding brilliance in beating the Zemis 10-7! In the finals, Sahel played the Japanese team and beat them 13-6 to take first place with an all student team for the first time in Sahel Academy history!!
The Comets showed a great effort in all of the games they played. They made some great hits and plays both offensively and defensively. Even though they didn’t win any games, they showed great team spirit and positive sportsmanship, as well as being an encouragement towards the teams they played.
Sunday evening, an awards banquet was held at the Rec Center. There was a slide show of softball pictures taken by lots of people, followed by the awards. An award for the best softball accessories’ was given to a member of the Zemis who wore pink socks and a Boston Red Sox hat. A ’king of the road’ award was given to Tim Smith for hitting three consecutive homeruns in one game while having an injured knee. Some other awards were ‘most missed’ for injured team members and ‘pumpkin pitcher’ for pitchers that wore orange shirts during a game.
Last but not least were the trophies. In the Social Division, the trophy went to the ‘Sahel Suns’ for their 13-6 win over the Japanese team in the finals. Next up was the Nomads who received the first place trophy for defeating the Sahel Angels in a bone-crushing 30-6 win in the finals!! ~Jonathan