While the New Iberia Holiday Sporting Goods Cajuns’ bid to go to the American Legion State Tournament fell short this year, two local Legion teams are going to the state tournament -- the Junior American Legion State Tournament.

Catholic High-based Blue Stream Services and New Iberia Senior High-based Cajun Sting both received bids to the junior legion tournament which begins Thursday at Plaquemine High School.

Blue Stream, which won the District 3-Central title to receive the automatic bid, will play the champion from District 6-East at 9:30 a.m. in the first game of the tournament. Cajun Sting, which finished second in the district but got into the state tournament when the District 7-East champion pulled out, will play the representative from District 3-West, a Notre Dame High-based team based from Crowley, at 12:30 p.m. Thursday.

Michael Landry of Blue Stream Services bats earlier this season. Blue Stream Services and the Cajun Sting, two New Iberia teams, will play in the American Legion Junior State Tournament in Plaquemine this week. - Lee Ball / The Daily Iberian Advertisement

The two local teams are on opposite sides of the bracket but could meet in the winner’s bracket final set for Saturday at 6:30 p.m. The tournament goes on until Monday when the state champion is crowned.

Blue Stream Services

It’s been a successful season for Blue Stream, coach Steve Miller said Tuesday.

“We’ve been together now for two years and we’ve got a core of 10 sophomores who have really performed well for us,” said Miller. “We had the expectation this year when the season started that we could win the state title.”

Heading into the state tournament, Miller likes the way his team is performing but noticed some areas the team can work on improving.

“We play really solid but we’ve had this tendency to start slowly then start coming on by the third or fourth inning,” sad Miller. “What we’ve been working on is trying to get the kids to get started early.

“We need them to step up and get going early in the game.”

One of the problems that Miller says hurts a team in the state tournament is that the teams come into it blind, not knowing much about the competition in the tournament.

“We’re know the areas that are going to be represented,” said Miller. “But we usually don’t see the teams that are going to play unless we run into them in a tournament somewhere.”

Miller said the breakdown of the teams usually includes two from the Shreveport Area, one from Lafayette, two from Lake Charles, one from Baton Rouge and one from the Eastern end of the state along with the New Iberia team.

One of the strengths of Blue Stream as the team heads to the state tournament is pitching.

“We’re going to lean on our pitchers,” said Miller. “Shea Simmons is out until Saturday, so we’re going to start Thomas Robin Thursday. Then we have Zack Lejuene, who pitched a two-hitter against Delcambre, Justin Garcia and Jacob Martin who can also pitch for us.

“We have about seven pitchers on the staff and we’re going to need them all due to the format of the tournament.”

Miller will also count on a couple of hitters in the lineup, Michael Landry, who has some pop in his bat, according to Miller, and Thomas Theriot.

Cajun Sting

Cajun Sting coach Bert Miguez was hoping that his team would get lucky and get a bid into the tournament, and he got his wish earlier this week when he received a call telling him that another team had dropped out and that the Sting was invited to participate.

“All year these kids really stepped up and played older teams or better quality teams,” said Miguez. “I really feel like we can come out and play some good baseball in the tournament.

“A.J. Jones called me Monday night with the news. We had a couple of kids in Florida (on vacation) but they are expected in Wednesday night. The team is excited about going to state.”

Miguez told the team after the last game that there was a chance the team would go to the state tournament.

“I had a good feeling that we would get the call,” said Miguez. “But I didn’t get the chance to practice as much as I wanted to, but I don’t think that we are going to be the only ones in that boat.”

The Cajun Sting coach will count on several players this weekend.

“We lost three players from last year but the base of the team was coming back and we had high expectations this year,” said Miguez. “We’re going to start off Thursday with Cody Boutte, who’s been our most consistent pitcher.

“Thomas Smith, Myles McGhee, Shawn Olivier along with Trent Broussard, if we can get their sticks going, that’s going to determine a lot at the tournament. Because of the format and the lack of pitching depth that teams have, hitting is going to (have to) in the tournament (for us). If we can get out sticks going, I think that we should do very well.”