Valley League Announces New Schedule

HARRISONBURG – The Valley Baseball League announced its 2009 schedule December 10 following a vote of the league’s Board of Directors following its November meeting.

With the Rockbridge Rapids coming on board this summer as the league’s 12th member, the Board voted to split into three four-team divisions for the 2009 season.

Fauquier, Front Royal, Haymarket and Winchester will comprise the North Division, Harrisonsburg, Luray, New Market and Woodstock the Central and Covington, Rockbridge, Staunton and Waynesboro the South.

The top two teams from each division plus two wild cards (the two best records of the non-qualified teams) will make up an eight-team playoff bracket. The three divisional winners are assured of the top three seeds while the remaining top seed will come from the second place team with the best overall record.

The first round will be a best-of-three series while the semi-finals and championship round will both be best-of-five.

The playoff matchups will be seeded strictly on record and the bracket will be reseeded following the first round.

Teams will again play a 44-game schedule, beginning on June 5 and ending July 30. Each team will play eight games against their three divisional opponents and two against the eight out-of-division teams for a total of 40 games.

The remaining four games will be played as “geographic cross-overs”, with the teams from the northern part of the Shenandoah Valley taking on a squad from the southern half.

Woodstock will host the league’s annual All-Star game on Sunday, July 12; this game will be part of a four-day break for the league. July 13 and 14 are scheduled as rain date while the entire league will take off Wednesday, July 15 to take part in an All-Star game against a team from the Cal Ripken League. Please check back to www.valleyleaguebaseball.com in the near future for more details about this game against the Ripken All-Stars.

Complete Printable Schedule

The Valley League is an NCAA-sanctioned wood-bat summer league in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and is heading to its 86th season of competition this summer.