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The 12 teams in the BSF’s National Softball League 1 concluded their season at the Windsor Tournament on 16-17 July at Farnham Park, with the Pioneers putting up an 8-6 win over the National Champion Chromies in the final round-robin match of the day to take the NSL 1 title by half a game over H2O.
The results at Windsor also finalised which eight teams will contest the Premier Nationals at the Co-ed Slowpitch National Championships at Farnham Park on the weekend of 13-14 August.
Meanwhile, seven of the 12 teams in National Softball League 2 also played at Windsor, but the results did not produce any change in the NSL 2 standings.
NSL 2 teams still have three tournaments to go over the next three weekends -- the East Midlands Labor Day Tournament, the Manchester Tournament and Diamond Series 3 – to decide final placings and which six teams will get automatic invitations to the Platinum Nationals.
NSL 1
The final NSL 1 event of the season at Windsor produced some drama and some changes to the standings over the course of the weekend, with both the NSL 1 title and places in the Premier National Championships at stake.
At the start of play on Saturday, H2O were sitting in first place, 2.5 games ahead of the second-placed Pioneers, but by the end of play on Sunday, the Pioneers had leap-frogged to the title with that tense last-game win over Chromies.
But if H2O was disappointed to be knocked off the top spot at the end, LNZ had an even more bitter pill to swallow. They started Saturday morning in the eighth and final Premier Nationals place, but lost all of their eight games over the weekend and finished dead last in the final standings.
The team that moved past LNZ and all the way up to seventh place by the end of the weekend was Thunder.
The defending National Champion Chromies, languishing in fifth place at the start of the weekend, went 5-2 over the course of the two days and finished in third place, from where Doug Clouston’s troops will be confident of mounting another strong challenge at the Premier Nationals.
So the eight teams that will contest the Premier Nationals on the weekend of 13-14 August at Farnham Park, playing for a national title and a place in the next European Slowpitch Cup, are:
Pioneers
H2O
Chromies
Blue Steel
Knights
Legends
Thunder
Slammers
The four teams that finished below them and failed to gain a place in the Premier Nationals are:
Greensox
Terriers
Bees
LNZ
Here are the final NSL 1 standings:
| TEAMS | WON | LOST | DRAWN | RF | RA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pioneers | 17 | 5 | 0 | 225 | 117 |
| H2O | 16 | 5 | 1 | 242 | 149 |
| Chromies | 13 | 7 | 2 | 209 | 161 |
| Blue Steel | 13 | 8 | 1 | 191 | 151 |
| Knights | 12 | 9 | 1 | 161 | 156 |
| Legends | 12 | 10 | 0 | 198 | 163 |
| Thunder | 8 | 10 | 4 | 183 | 169 |
| Slammers | 10 | 12 | 0 | 128 | 195 |
| Greensox | 6 | 13 | 3 | 152 | 201 |
| Terriers | 6 | 13 | 3 | 168 | 220 |
| Bees | 6 | 16 | 0 | 145 | 209 |
| LNZ | 5 | 16 | 1 | 117 | 228 |
NSL 2
The seven NSL 2 teams that competed at Windsor, and their records on the day, were:
| TEAMS | WON | DRAWN | LOST |
|---|---|---|---|
| KKs | 6 | 0 | 1 |
| SPAM | 5 | 0 | 2 |
| Bees "B" | 5 | 0 | 2 |
| Blitz | 4 | 1 | 2 |
| Maidenhead Royals3 | 4 | 1 | 2 |
| Ninos Privados | 3 | 1 | 3 |
| Warriors | 3 | 0 | 4 |
Here are the NSL 2 standings following the Windsor event:
| TEAMS | WON | LOST | DRAWN | WIN PCT |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dodgers | 17 | 3 | 0 | ,850 |
| Outlaws | 10 | 2 | 1 | .808 |
| Mavericks | 12 | 3 | 0 | .800 |
| Ninos Privados | 24 | 8 | 2 | .735 |
| Blitz | 19 | 7 | 1 | .722 |
| KKs | 23 | 9 | 3 | .700 |
| SPAM | 16 | 10 | 0 | .615 |
| Misfits | 11 | 8 | 1 | .575 |
| Bees "B" | 12 | 12 | 2 | .500 |
| Warriors | 12 | 14 | 1 | .463 |
| Maidenhead Royals | 11 | 15 | 1 | .426 |
| Mariners | 4 | 8 | 0 | .333 |