BY TITUS MOHLER
SUFFOLK NEWS-HERALD

WINDSOR—The Windsor Longhorns Pinto team won its Little League baseball championship Saturday, making Coach Travis Luter keep a promise to get his hair cut into a Mohawk.

The Pintos took the long road to the championship after a 15-4 loss to the Smithfield Yankees put them in the loser’s bracket of the double-elimination tournament.

Additionally, at the Pinto level, teams field 10 players, but the Longhorns played with nine throughout the tournament due to an injury.

The team beat the Nansemond River River Bandits 11-7, the Smithfield Pirates 10-5 and Yankees, 9-8.

Then the Longhorns faced the Smithfield Cubs in the championship. A side effect of being in the loser’s bracket meant the Longhorns had to win a doubleheader against the Cubs to take the crown.

The Longhorns took a 14-3 lead in the first game, though the Cubs rattled off six runs in the final inning. The Longhorns won 14-9.

In the second game, the Longhorns led 9-2, until the Cubs piled up another massive sixth inning. The Longhorns fell behind 11-9 going into the bottom of the sixth.

They scored a run and then Trent Luter came up to bat. With two outs and two strikes, Luter hit the ball, driving the runner from second to home to tie the game up at 11. Then, Gavin Tomlin hit the walk-off home run to bring the championship home.

“Yeah, the little guys, man, I tell you, they were like giants out there today,” Luter said. “I’ve never had a championship of my own, of all the years I’ve played. My brother that (coaches) with me, he never had one. The first championship he, and I got was through this team.”

And as a man of his word, Luter has a haircut to remember it by.