This games have begun at the So Cal A’s Invitational with action starting at 7:45 am PST (10:45 EST) this morning.

The top eight finishers at last summer’s PGF 18U Nationals are involved and the individual talent is a Who’s Who of the Hot 100.

Every team has at least one player in the Hot 100 and the defending PGF champion OC Batbusters have seven! All told, there are 40 players in the 2015 Hot 100 who’ll take the field!

The event, which is being held at Hillview School in Santa Ana, Calif., runs through Sunday.

Note: all of the games will be streamed by FloSoftball! Click here to log in or sign-up (and note that the one-time fee is good for the month and will cover other tournaments as well as content here on FloSoftball.com!!!).

Friday Pool Play

Time	Field 1	Field 2
7:45	Wichita Mustangs vs. Gold Coast Hurricanes	Birmingham Thunderbolts vs. So Cal Choppers
9:30	OC Batbusters vs. Birmingham Thunderbolts	Corona Angels vs. So Cal Choppers
11:15	Corona Angels vs. Gold Coast Hurricanes	Wichita Mustangs vs. Texas Glory
1:00	OC Batbusters vs. Texas Glory	Firecrackers vs. Jersey Intensity
2:45	So Cal A's vs. Explosion	East Cobb Bullets vs. Beverly Bandits
4:30	Explosion vs. Jersey Intensity	Firecrackers vs. Beverly Bandits
6:15	So Cal A's vs. East Cobb Bullets	Explosion vs. Beverly Bandits

Saturday Pool Play

Time	Field 1	Field 2
7:45	So Cal A's vs. Jersey Intensity	Firecrackers vs East Cobb Bullets
9:30	Explosion vs. East Cobb Bullets	Beverly Bandits vs. Jersey Intensity
11:15	So Cal Athletics vs. Firecrackers	So Cal Choppers vs. Wichita Mustangs
1:00	Corona Angels vs. Birmingham Thunderbolts	OC Batbusters vs. Gold Coast Hurricanes
2:45	Batbusters vs. Wichita Mustangs	So Cal Choppers vs. Texas Glory
4:30	Corona Angels vs. Texas Glory	Birmingham Thunderbolts
6:15	Bracket Game

Sunday is Bracket Play

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As Event Director Bruce Richardsons says, “There are no bad games in this event, every team is quality and you have to play your best to do well.”

Here’s the list of the teams in alphabetical order:

• Beverly Bandits (Ill.)
• Birmingham Thunderbolts (Ala.)
• Corona Angels (Calif.)
• East Cobb Bullets (Ga.)
• Explosion (Calif.)
• Firecrackers-Rico (Calif.)
• Gold Coast Hurricanes (Fla.)
• Jersey Intensity (N.J.)
• OC Batbusters Haning/Stith (Calif.)
• So Cal A’s (Calif.)
• So Cal Choppers (Calif.)
• Texas Glory (Texas)
• Wichita Mustangs (Kan.)

What also makes the event appealing is that this will probably be the only time all summer most of these top teams will face each other as three—the Wichita Mustangs, the East Cobb Bullets and the Gold Coast Hurricanes—will be playing in the initial USA Softball JO Cup which will run at the same time as the PGF Nationals, where the rest of the teams are expected to play.

“Everyone knows I promote a non-political event,” says Event Director Bruce Richardson, who’s the head coach for the So Cal A’s, winners of the first four PGF Nationals. “For us, it’s not what association you belong to or what Nationals you go to. It never will be and this is not a tournament about making money primarily.”

Richardson explains that the event is invite only and even though he’s had as many as 70 or 80 teams want to play, he’s had to keep the number of teams participating down.

“We don’t take entrees because we have only so many teams because of the limited number of fields.”

The coach says the event originally began four years ago as a way for top teams, particularly in Southern Calif., to play each other to prepare for the stretch run to Nationals

“Our coaches and I made a conscious decision to play best the competition we could play,” he explains, “and I put it out early on to see if it’d be a viable event. People bought into it as a good chance to face great teams before heading to Boulder (for the Independence Day Tournament and the Colorado Fireworks and Sparkler tournaments).

As the list shows, six of the 13 teams are from So Cal while the rest are spread out and come from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, New Jersey and Texas.

“The teams I pick from area here are, for the most part, the best teams in the area and I want some out-of-state variety representing different places and we pull in the best teams in those regions too.”

According to Richardson, the draw for the teams that do get the coveted invite is they hit the ground running, so to speak, in playing the best of the best caliber of talent.

“There’s not one game you’ll play here,” the championship coach says, “where it’s not against top competition. You can’t have a down game because, for the most part, every player on these teams is elite and already committed.”

“We only have 17 players on our team and only one – Samantha Diaz, a sophomore middle infielder—is still uncommitted and she should be done by the end of the summer. The rest of the teams are like that too.”

The coach stresses that it’s not about winning the event, but getting a sense of where you are and where you need to be as a team.

“In the four years of the Invitational, we’ve probably been around .500 for the event— it’s just not an easy deal. You can’t come in with one pitcher and walk through this thing; it takes a team to be competitive.

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Here are pools and schedule of games for the So Cal A’s Invitational:

Pool A

1. So Cal Athletics
2. Firecrackers-Rico
3. Explosion
4. Beverly Bandits
5. Jersey Intensity
6. EC Bullets

Pool B

1. OC Batbusters – Haning/Stith
2. Corona Angels
3. So Cal Choppers
4. Wichita Mustangs
5. Birmingham Thunderbolts
6. Texas Glory
7. Gold Coast Hurricanes