The Bald-Headed Truth

MIL baseball making big ‘‘state’’ment

This is the first year of the Division II state tournament, so it is safe to say that this has never happened before.

The MIL has three teams — D-I champion Maui High and D-II champ St. Anthony, along with D-II runner-up Molokai — in the semifinals of the state tournaments.

That is more than any other league in the state, including the vaunted ILH (2). The KIF, BIIF, and OIA all have one team in the state’s two final fours.

It is a pretty startling accomplishment for any league, especially from a Neighbor Island, but not out of whack when looking at history. The MIL has seven state champions in the previous 49 state tournaments, while the 32-team OIA has 13 state titles, the ILH 28 and the Big Island one.

And all of this with four-time state champion Baldwin, which has been to more state baseball tournaments than any other team in the state, losing in the first round. That continued a trend the MIL would like to see change — the Bears haven’t won a championship round game since their last state title in 1995.

Read the link to check out how it all happened Thursday.

The Maui News will be there starting today to document all of it.