The American Legion Baseball 3rd Division tournament championship was held at Sherrard High School on a hot, muggy Saturday. It was a match up of the top two seeds coming into the tournament. By virtue of a loss in the winner’s bracket semifinal on Friday, top-seed Rock Island Post 200 had to beat 2nd seeded Galesburg Post 285 twice to claim the Division title. Both teams had already clinched a spot in the Illinois State Tournament this week in Aviston, but each team wanted to hoist the 3rd Division Chairman’s Trophy. Galesburg had not won the Division championship since bringing the program back in 2022 from a 4-year hiatus. Rock Island was looking for its 4th straight Division title, after knocking off Galesburg in the 2025 division championship game. Galesburg played in the 2023 Illinois State Tournament by virtue of hosting the tournament that summer.
On Saturday, Rock Island trailed Galesburg 4-3 after three innings in what turned out to be the first of two games that were played. Post 200 pushed across five runs in the top of the 4th and three more in the top of the 5th. Rock Island would hold on for an 11-5 victory to force a winner-take-all game. Despite the loss, Ian Leffler would go 3-for-3 and Hayden Ralston blasted his 5th home run of the season.
Rock Island kept that momentum going into game two, taking an early 2-0 lead after their first at-bat in the bottom of the first. Galesburg would score three runs in each of the top of the 3rd and 4th innings to take a commanding 6-2 lead after four innings. A bases loaded clearing double by Ralston in the 3rd gave Galesburg their first lead of the game. Leffler would do the same in the 4th clearing the bases with another double. Rock Island closed the gap to two runs with a pair of runs in the bottom of the 4th but Galesburg would push three more runs across the plate in the top of 6th. This time, it was Noah Nalley smashing a 2-run homer over the left field fence. Nalley hit two home runs off Rock Island in an 18-1 winner’s bracket victory for Galesburg on Friday night. Chance Stewart tacked another run on the board later in the inning with a sacrifice fly. That tally proved to be a pivotal run, as a never-say-die Rock Island squad scored four runs in the bottom of the 6th to make it a 9-8 Galesburg lead heading to the 7th. Galesburg head coach Andrew Thomas brought in Keegan Smith to close out the game in the bottom of the 7th. Smith starting the inning with two strikeouts but a 2-out double put the tying run in scoring position. Rock Island would foul out to right fielder Owen Timmons for the final out and the celebration began for Post 285 as they get the 9-8 win and get their 20th victory of the season. Galesburg was out-hit in the game, 12-8 but took advantage of four extra base hits and seven walks.
Rock Island falls to (31-8) overall and Galesburg is now (20-6). They will both head to Aviston, Illinois for the Illinois State Tournament that gets underway on Wednesday. Aviston is 40 miles east of St. Louis. It will be an 8-team double elimination format with the championship scheduled for Sunday afternoon. The state champion will then move on to the Great Lakes Regional in Lexington, Kentucky Aug 5-9. The Great Lakes champ will join 7 other teams in Shelby, North Carolina for the American Legion Baseball World Series.
Illinois State Tournament bracket-
