YOUTH SCENE:

The players on the Newport-Mesa sixth-grade boys’ NJB All-Star basketball team can call themselves national champions.

The Newport-Mesa All-Stars, also known as the Spartans won the Nationals tournament last weekend at Cal State Fullerton.

The Spartans earned wins against Hayward, Las Vegas, San Jose and San Diego to take the crown. These four wins concluded a run of 11 wins and one loss over the course of two months and four tournaments.

The Spartans were led by tenacious defense that created numerous turnovers and an average margin of victory over 10.

Offensively, the team was led by Cameron Hook, Brett Greenlee, Chad Redfearn and Hagen Truninger, while the defense and rebounding duties were led by Parker Reposa, Jake Hastings, Trevor Schwartz, Ryan Stone, Caleb O’Neil and Nick Belida.

Approximately 50 teams competed in divisions for girls and boys eighth, sixth and fourth grades. A.C. Green provided the opening address.

Teams from as far away as Missouri competed in the tournament.

Newport-Mesa

Fourth-grade All Stars

The Up and Coming Stars, a Newport-Mesa NJB fourth-grade boys earned third place in the NJB National Basketball Tournament.

They went 9-2, beating teams from Las Vegas, San Jose and Castro Valley.

The team included: Chris Cox, Will Ueberroth, Mitch Haly, Chase Garbers, Sachin Gokhale, Connor Kincaid, Will Rodosky, Chase Furey, Matthew McDonald and Timothy Donald.

The coaches were Mike Kincaid, Grant Garbers and Jim Furey.

Costa Mesa

American Little League

Dodgers 2, Orioles 1: Then in the bottom of the sixth with a 2-2 count, Romar Ortiz hit a towering fly ball over the center field fence, a walk-off home run that gave the Dodgers the win April 18.

Both teams displayed excellent pitching efforts as the Dodgers struck out 10 Oriole batters, while the Orioles struck out 13 Dodger batters.

Trevor Cohen was the starting pitcher for the Dodgers and gave up a run in his two innings pitched. In the fifth inning Keith Marshall got things started for the Dodgers with a single and two stolen bases.

Cohen hit an RBI single, tying the score 1-1.

Daniel Morales closed out the game by pitching the final four innings of the game for the Dodgers.

— From staff reports