By DAVID FOLSE II

Sports Editor

RESERVE – The season is finished and you can mostly call it mission accomplished.

Despite not making the playoffs, the Riverside Extra Innings Club finished the 2005 American Legion season with a 10-6 overall record and 9-5 in district play. Playing in one of the more competitive districts in the entire state that featured several Class 5A state powers, the Rebels failed to qualify for the playoffs.

Rebels Head Coach Steve Stropolo said he was happy to get much of what he wanted to get done this summer.

“I thought we got accomplished what we wanted,” Stropolo said. “I got to see a couple of kids pitch at a little higher level than Class 2A because you have mostly 5A teams competing in Legion. I thought they did a nice job.

“I thought Cavin Richmond did an outstanding job. He showed a lot of character in many of his starts, including against a quality Hannan club where we lost 1-0.”

Hoping to see new faces possibly step up during the summer and fight for playing time in 2006, Stropolo said the summer was not as surprising as he might have expected.

“Nobody really surprised me,” Stropolo said. “Everyone usually did what they were suppose to do. In some aspects, there were several situations where we underperformed. There were really no surprises.”

With much of the Rebels returning for 2006, Stropolo said that there would not be that many new faces in 2006.

“Jay Falgoust is going to play next year for us,” Stropolo said. “He will be a name to watch out for in 2006. He will be an incoming sophomore. He played a little third base for us.

“But other than that, it will pretty much be the same set of players from last year’s squad. We needed to find an infielder and I think we did. Cavin played their last year and switched back and forth. When Labiche pitched, he played third and when Jordan (Poirrier) pitched he could play short. He can do that, he’s done it all year.”