DAIRYLAND LEAGUE BASEBALL - First Dairyland game is Sunday; WBA introduces A/B divisions for tourney
DAIRYLAND LEAGUE BASEBALL
A 2024 season in the Dairyland Baseball League that will have a different-looking finish gets underway this weekend.
The Wisconsin Rapids Redhawks will visit the Rhinelander River Monsters at noon Sunday in the league’s first game of the season. The Whittlesey Reds’ game at Merrill has been postponed to a date to be determined. The Reds will open next Sunday, May 19 at home against Everest at 1:30 p.m.
New this year to league members and the Wisconsin Baseball Association as a whole is a revised post-season format that, for the first time since 1967 season, will feature tournaments in A and B divisions.
The A Division consists of 29 teams from larger population areas, while the B Division is make up of 27 teams from smaller population areas. Twenty-four teams from each division will make the playoffs in August.
In the B division, much of that tournament action will take place in Taylor County.
Tannery Creek Park in Rib Lake will be one of four B Division regional sites on the weekend of Aug. 9-11 with the Rib Lake Osprey and Interwald Woodticks serving as co-hosts. Six teams will compete at each regional site in three-team, round-robin pools. The Augusta Athletics, Glidden Orioles and Ellsworth Hubbers are the other hosts in the division.
Pool winners will advance to the B Division state tournament, which will be hosted by the Whittlesey Reds. That eightteam field will compete in single-elimination bracket play during the weekend of Aug. 16-18.
All six Taylor County Dairyland teams –– Interwald, Medford, Rib Lake, Spirit, Westboro and Whittlesey are in the B Division, along with Abbotsford, Pittsville and Tomahawk.
In the A Division, the Haugen Knights, Merrill Rangers, River Falls Fighting Fish and Wisconsin Rapids Redhawks will serve as regional hosts. River Falls will also host the state finals. Dairyland teams from Merrill, Wisconsin Rapids, Everest, Marshfield, Minocqua and Rhinelander are in the A Division.
Regular-season play in the Dairyland will look the same as last year. Whittlesey will join the A Division teams in the Large Division, where teams will play a double round-robin format. The remaining eight teams will play a single round-robin season in the Small Division.
Play in the Small Division starts the weekend of June 8-9.
Rapids is the defending Large Division champion. Westboro won the 2023 regular-season title in the Small Division, while Interwald won the division’s post-season tournament.
