team has not been as big a story as previous years when local teams won the state championship and headed to Bristol, Connecticut for the regional tournament. The answer is not a simple one.

First you have the “been there, done that” factor. When the other little league in the township, Toms River East first sent a team to Bristol it was a big deal because it was the first. Lakewood had captured the Little League World Series in 1975 but the tournament was quite different at that time and that team was celebrated in grand fashion as I remember. Anyway the 1994 Toms River East team won the Eastern Regional and went to Williamsport for the World Series. It was a big deal but nothing compared to what would happen four years later when manager Mike Gaynor would take another Toms River East team to Pennsylvania. That 1998 group, led by Todd Frazier and Scott Fisher would win it all and I still consider that one of the most exciting things to happen in my 31 years at the radio station. Amazingly Gaynor took another group just one year later all the way to Williamsport where they would lose in the US Championship game.
The truth is that with three teams from Toms River going to the World Series in six years it became almost expected.

Move on to 2005 when it was time for Toms River’s other little league to produce a championship squad. Dr. Paul DeMartino managed a team that included his son Eric and Kyle Perry, who is now a standout player at Toms River High School South. They won the state title and went deep into the regional before falling just short. While the buzz surrounding that achievement was not like what had happened earlier it was unique because it was the original little league in the township and they got to enjoy the pomp and circumstance that came with being in the spotlight.

Flash forward to the present and again we have a group of Toms River little leaguers making headlines in Bristol, Connecticut. Today they’ll get to play on national television for the first time when they face Stony Point, New York in the Mid-Atlantic Regional semifinals at 11am. The game will be shown on ESPN2 and if they win it’s onto to Monday night’s finals. By then the buzz might be very loud.