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Victor Juarez went first. He and the other San Nicolás Gallos representing Mexico in the 2016 Little League World Series were standing on the grass hill overlooking whats known as the Original Field on Fourth Street in Williamsport. Thats when Juarez decided to roll down to the bottom of the berm. After the initial cries of Youre crazy, player after player began following suit, some pulling their shirts over their arms to lessen the resistance.They were a bunch of teens and tweens having fun two days before the start of the LLWS, but it wasnt just about that. They were also rolling in history. On that very field, back in 1957, a band of boys from Monterrey, the Industriales, became the first team from outside the United States to win the World Series. On the diamond on the other side of the fence Angel Macias threw a perfect game in the final 4-0 victory against La Mesa, California, before an overflow crowd of 10,000.To this day, it remains the only perfect game in LLWS title game history. And now, 49 years later, these kids from a suburb of Monterrey were communing with Los Pequenos Gigantes, the Little Giants. They look so small, says catcher Luis Nuncio, peering at the team photo from 57 which hangs in the mini-museum at the Original. Indeed, at 5-foot-10, Nuncio would tower over any of the Little Giants.To get to Williamsport, that 1957 team had to walk across the border at Reynosa and hitch rides to McAllen, Texas. Over four weeks, they won 13 games to take the Texas state and then the South regional championships -- at one point, their visas expired and the State Department had to come to the rescue.The 2016 representatives from Mexico havent had it nearly that hard. But the trip hasnt been a piece of cake, either. They had to fly from Monterrey to Dallas, then Dallas to Newark, where they boarded a bus for the four-hour ride west on I-80. The air-conditioning on the bus broke down in the stifling heat, but fortunately, Juarez shortened the ride by leading his teammates in renditions of romantic ballads.As with every one of the 16 teams in the LLWS, San Nicolás had to run the gantlet of a regional tournament -- 7,000 teams from 81 countries played 16,000 games to get here. Mexicos test was especially tough: 14 teams came to Monterrey, including Guadalupe Linda Vista, the last Mexican team to win the World Series in 1997. In the championship game, San Nicolás prevailed in a 6-5 thriller over Norte de Hermosillo, a team that had beaten the Gallos just two days before. No team from San Nicolás had ever made it to Williamsport.During the week-long tournament, they watched a special screening of The Perfect Game, a 2009 theatrical release based on a book by William Winokur about the 57 team. What made it truly special was that two members of the Little Giants were in attendance: lifelong friends Pepe Maiz and Angel Macias.It was a great inspiration for the kids, says Antonio Rodriguez, the head coach of the Gallos when hes not teaching computer science at the Technical Institute of Nuevo León. They had seen the movie before, but to see it in the company of those great men really lifted their spirits.Cinema aficionados might find fault with The Perfect Game as an unevenly acted, somewhat cliched film. But Jake T. Austin is convincing in his portrayal of the ambidextrous, 88-pound Macias, and Cheech Marin enlivens the picture as the priest who helps coach the boys. And theres a nice scene of the players rolling around in the real grass of a baseball field -- something they had never seen before. The movie manages to capture a sense of the obstacles the Industriales had to face: poverty and resistance at home, and prejudice and resentment across the border.Much has happened -- in both Williamsport and the world -- since then. The site of the World Series was moved across the Susquehanna River to South Williamsport in 1959 at what is now Howard J. Lamade Stadium. Little League participation has grown from 475,000 and just a few countries in 1957 to more than 2 million in more than 100 nations today. The Little League complex is now a small city that includes an impressive museum, a second stadium, practice fields galore and The Grove, where the players and coaches live, eat and mingle for the two weeks of the Series. Once restricted to just boys, Little League now hosts a variety of tournaments in baseball, softball and the Challenger Division. And ESPN now provides full coverage of the games, starting with the very first one, which happened to be Mexico vs. Panama at Volunteer Stadium.The team from Aguadulce, Panama, drubbed San Nicolás 10-2 in the opener. It was close for a while, with Juarez striking out 12 batters in the first five innings, but the wheels came off when Panama scored five in the top of the sixth inning. The Little League World Series is a double-elimination tournament, however, and Mexico has battled back, beating Italy 12-7 and then Canada 7-1, as Juarez pitched three no-hit innings and Jose Angel Leal hit a two-run homer. Leal took the mound against Australia on Wednesday and struck out 10 of the 11 batters he faced in a 10-0, five-inning win.If San Nicolás is to follow in the footsteps of the 57 team, though, it will have to pull off a miracle nearly as big. The last team to lose its opener and go on to win the title was Sierra Maestra, Venezuela, back in 2000, when the Little League World Series had only eight teams. The Gallos next play South Korea on Thursday at 3 p.m. at Lamade Stadium. Jaurez will start. Should he and Mexico win that game, they will advance to the international championship -- and a rematch with Panama -- on Saturday.Though the World Series seems to get bigger and bigger each year, the world seems somehow smaller for those two weeks, as Williamsport opens its arms. For one thing, the kids are welcomed with all manner of swag. Upon arrival, each player is given a bat, a glove and shoes by Easton, sunglasses by Oakley and a breakdown of their mechanics by the Baseball Factory.For another, the teams are assigned gracious hosts who help them navigate the terrain and logistics. The San Nicolás entrants drew Chuck Snyder and Hess Wentz, who are sitting in a golf cart, watching the team practice in the midday heat on a field thats a long walk from The Grove. Chuck and Hess are old hands at this.I like this team a lot, says Snyder, a retired state policeman. Very respectful and disciplined, but we also felt an instant rapport with them. Ive been doing this for 17 years, and theyre one of the best teams Ive had.You shouldve seen them last night in The Grove, says Wentz, a retired dentist. The truly wonderful thing about the Series is seeing the kids interact with each other, speaking the same language at the pingpong table, even though the Koreans dont know any Spanish, and the Mexicans dont know any Korean.The Gallos come in all shapes and sizes -- from 80-pound Patricio Juarez to 184-pound Rene Villareal -- but it only takes a few minutes of watching them practice to realize that they can really play, and that they are very well-coached.The non-English-speaking international teams are each assigned a translator, and Mexicos is Antonio Gonzalez, a Little League administrator from Cayey, Puerto Rico, where he is also the city engineer. I followed San Nicolás in the Mexico tournament, and I was very impressed, he says. Very good pitching, very good defense, and if they hit, theyll go far. Because the coaches are so young, they relate well to the players.Rodriguez, the coach, played second base for Monclova in the Mexican League, and he has baseball in his genes. His uncle, Carlos Rodriguez, played shortstop for the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox, and his grandfather, Leo Rodriguez, was an infielder in the Pittsburgh Pirates system. (During the same year that Macias pitched a game that Hollywood would immortalize, Leo was a member of the Hollywood Stars, along with slugger Dick Stuart.)He would tell stories of playing with Roberto Clemente, says Rodriguez. One of them was about the time they had to bring him his food because the restaurant wouldnt let him inside.Hopefully, I will be able to tell my grandchildren stories about this World Series.The two players the Gallos will rely most on are Nuncio and Victor Juarez. Nuncio is not only a catcher, but also the closer, and his left-handed stroke is a thing of beauty. Juarez, whose fastball would translate to 100 mph at 60 feet, 6 inches, plays shortstop or third when hes not pitching. He and his little brother Patricio are the grandsons of Joel Serna, a second baseman and baseball legend who played in the Mexican League for 21 years.Victor is also the acknowledged leader of the team. Says Gonazalez, The other day at the pool in The Grove, he was serenading the lifeguards with one of his ballads (Que Caro Estoy Pagando by Los Plebes del Rancho). He does have a good voice.?But they are only two. The Gallos could not have gotten to Williamsport without first baseman Milton Gonzalez. The unlikely hero of the championship game, says Hector Bencomo, a Monterrey sportswriter who knows the team well. He came in the game in the last inning with men on first and third and one out, and got the last two outs. They have other strong pitchers in Jose Leal and Isaac Cortes, a sparkplug in shortstop Gael Garcia, and a centerfielder, Fabian Mar, who plays much bigger than his height of 411.I think theyre going to make some noise, says Bencomo. Some good noise.?Outside Lamade Stadium is a sculpture that says Williamsport Welcomes The World above 16 different home plates that name the teams and the distance they traveled to get there -- Nuevo León is 2,010 miles away.Wherever the Gallos went in Williamsport, they were greeted with warmth and consideration. At the picnic held at the Penn College of Technology on the eve of the Series, they hung out at a huge white rock painted to look like a baseball, signing their names, climbing atop the rock and making new friends.Then it was time to board the flatbed truck that would carry them through the annual Grand Slam Parade down Fourth Street, right past the Original Field into downtown Williamsport. Because their float was sponsored by Entenmanns Bakery, they got to throw bags of Little Bites to the children and not just candy. But thats not why they had the spectators on both sides of the street chanting, Mex-i-co, Mex-i-co. They pumped up the crowd by waving their arms and proudly puffing out their shirts.At the corner of Fourth and Park, the players spotted their parents and relatives, some of whom had driven two days to get to Williamsport. It really took us 35 years to get here, says Rodolfo Cantu, the father of Diego Cantu, a second baseman and outfielder on the team. Thats how long our Little League has been in existence. But it was worth the wait.As the float drew abreast of the families, the Gallos and their kin started singing to one another in Spanish -- a special chant that the kids themselves had written. Loosely translated, it went like this:Yes sir, I am a Gallo, I always play with passion, We respect our rivals, But we always play to win. I flew from Monterrey And I will make it to the finish line. United till the end And together we can.These kids from San Nicolás, Nuevo León, brought their own music to a street corner in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. You had to be there. It was kind of perfect. Under Armour Destockage . And when it opened, every player was at his stall. Thats a sure sign that a team is in a slump and is searching for answers. "Its embarrassing to be at home and play the way we did," said defenceman Josh Gorges. Under Armour Moins Cher . Emery skated the length of the ice and fought an unwilling Holtby during the third period of the Flyers 7-0 loss Friday night in Philadelphia. He was given 29 penalty minutes, including a game misconduct. But Emery did not face even a disciplinary hearing with NHL senior vice president of player safety Brendan Shanahan because rules 46. http://www.underarmourpascher.fr/ . - After leading the Saints to a fourth playoff appearance in five seasons, Drew Brees expressed confidence in the direction of his team and, perhaps more importantly, showed a willingness to listen to contract proposals if the team needs his help getting under the NFLs salary cap. Chaussure Under Armour Pas Cher . -- Its been a long road back for Sean Bergenheim. Acheter Basket Under Armour . Boucher previously coached the Tampa Bay Lightning and had a 97-78-20 record over two-plus seasons. He was dismissed by the team last March after the Lightning struggled in the lockout-shortened season with a 13-18-1 record. FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- With a pair of long touchdown passes, Boston College picked up its first victory in almost a year and may have changed its reputation as a run-first offense in the process.Patrick Towles hit former quarterback Jeff Smith on back-to-back, one-play TD drives, and substitute Mike Knoll connected on a pair of field goals on Saturday as the Eagles beat Massachusetts 26-7 for their first win in 10 games.BC was trailing 7-0 late in the second quarter when Towles, taking over at the UMass 46-yard line, found Smith on the first play of the drive. After the Minutemen fumbled at their own 36, Towles again hit Smith on the first play to give the Eagles the lead for good.Totally turned the game around, BC coach Steve Addazio said. Now we have the ability to go and strike it (big).BC has long been known as a rushing team, sending backs like Heisman Trophy finalist Andre Williams to the NFL, along with enough run-blockers to staff a couple of offensive lines. But when Addazio saw UMass trying to crowd the line of scrimmage to take away the ground game, he decided it was time to go for it.People dont expect those shots on first down, especially from us, said Towles, who completed 12 of 22 passes for 191 yards for the Eagles (1-1) and also ran 12 times for 66 yards. Well take that.Smith had five catches for 98 yards, and Jon Hilliman ran 22 times for 54 yards and a 15-yard touchdown for BC, which last won on Sept. 25, 2015, against Northern Illinois. The Eagles lost their final eight games last season and their opener last week, 17-14 to Georgia Tech in Ireland.You need to enjoy the wins, Addazio said. This is a tough game, a tough business were all in. This easily could have been a different scenario, when youre coming off what we came off of.Colton Lichtenberg missed a pair of short field goals last week; Addazio said he was unavailable on Saturday because of a strain in his kicking leg. Knoll, who had been used exclusively in kickoffs, missed his first point-after attempt but converted the second time to make it 13-7.He added third-quarter field goals of 40 and 37 yards.Its unfortuunate Colton went down, Knoll said.ddddddddddddBut hell be back and well all be kicking lights out.UMass (0-2) put a scare into No. 25 Florida last week, trailing just 10-7 into the fourth quarter. Returning to their sometime home at Gillette Stadium, the Minutemen took a 7-0 lead on a 58-yard pass from Ross Comis to Adam Breneman late in the first quarter.Comis went 11 of 28 for 145 yards and a touchdown. But he also had a pair of first-half fumbles and threw an interception in the third quarter; the turnovers led to 10 BC points.I can give you the old adage, `Ill look at the tape. But, yeah, he lost the game, UMass coach Mark Whipple said. As the quarterback, you dont like to lose. Weve only got two touchdowns in two games.NICE TO BE HEREWith BCs kicking troubles the past few years, Knoll was one of the players requested to the postgame interview area.Yeah, you dont get called up very often. Its good, Knoll said, breaking into a smile. Thanks for bringing me in.Reminded that a kicker is usually asked to speak after missing a field goal, he said: Yeah, thats true. Thats the life we chose.SETTLE DOWNThe Eagles trailed 7-0 and had just 55 total yards in the opening quarter. The touchdowns 84 seconds apart in the second quarter helped the offense relax, Smith said.Being down, that was a real surprise, he said. But I think scoring those two touchdowns quick, really picked (us) up and helped the defense, too. It really gave us confidence to come out in the second half.THE TAKEAWAYBC: In light of BCs struggles to win in the conference, finishing off the Minutemen gives them an FBS win before heading into the ACC opener against Virginia Tech next week.UMASS: After staying close against No. 25 Florida, the Minutemen put another scare into a major college team. But Whipples independent team needs to finish off a victory if it is going to attract an invitation from a conference.UP NEXTBC: Plays at Virginia Tech on Saturday.UMASS: Hosts Florida International on Saturday. 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