 New team in National Pro Fastpitch
Nederlands
 NASHVILLE, Tennessee (USA) -
National Pro Fastpitch (NPF) announced on Tuesday (November 19) that a new team will enter the league next season.
Pennsylvania Rebellion will become the newest addition in the professional softball-league.
National Pro Fastpitch is for women softball what the Major League is for baseball, the highest professional league.
,,Western Pennsylvania is known as a sports powerhouse, and there is a thriving community of fastpitch players and fans at the youth, high school, and college levels'', said Francine W. Williams, who is the team owner and managing partner of the Rebellion.
,,There are 797 high schools in Pennsylvania with girls' softball and 2500 member youth teams registered in the area.
When you add college teams and youth organizations, the area of western Pennsylvania, northern West Virginia and southeastern Ohio comprise the third largest concentration of women's softball players in the country.
This thriving community will now be able to experience the game at its highest level of play.''
Pennsylvania Rebellion will play its home games in CONSOL Energy Park in the city of Washington, which is located within the Pittsburgh Metro Area.
The stadium is also the site of the Washington Wild Things, a professional baseball-team that plays in the independent Frontier League.
Pennsylvania Rebellion takes the place of NY/NJ Comets, which was unable to secure a consistent venue inside the New York-New Jersey area.
The roster of the Comets transfers to the Rebellion, which also gets the draft positions of the Comets during the 2014 College Draft.
,,This is the first time an NPF team will be placed full time into an established and thriving minor league baseball market'', said NPF-Commissioner Cheri Kempf.
,,Western Pennsylvania is legendary for its sports and its ever-growing fan base, so we're thrilled for it to be the latest setting for fast-paced NPF action.''
Pennsylvania Rebellion becomes the second NPF-team to be located in the state of Pennsylvania.
From 2006 through 2009, Philadelphia Force was a member of the NPF, playing its games in Allentown.
In May 2008, the Netherlands National Women Softball Team practiced in Allentown and played against the Force.
During that trip, the Orange squad also played eight more games against two other NPF-teams.
The games were part of the official NPF-competition that year.
The trip was part of the preparations of the Dutch Team for the Olympic Games in Beijing (China) later in the year.
In 2014, the NPF will again have four teams in its league.
The Rebellion joins Akron Racers, Chicago Bandits and USSSA Pride.
The four teams play a 48-game schedule from June through August.
This season, Chicago Bandits finished in first place with a 36-12 record.
Top-players as Monica Abbott, Andrea Duran, Jennie Finch, Kelly Kretschman, Caitlin Lowe, Jessica Mendoza, Cat Osterman, Keilani Ricketts and Natasha Watley have played or are playing in the National Pro Fastpitch.
The NPF also announced that it has awarded their Championship Series for 2014, 2015 and 2016 to Southern Sports Group, a management agency located in Birmingham, Alabama.
The agency will manage the event for the upcoming three years.
The Championship Series will be played in Hoover Metropolitan Stadium in Hoover, which is the largest suburb of Birmingham.
The 2014 Championship Series, which will be a 4-day event, are scheduled for August 20-23 and included all four teams in the league.
This season, USSSA Pride won the NPF-Championship, defeating Chicago Bandits 2-1 in the best-of-three final.
The Championship Series were held in Rosemont (Illinois).
(November 21)
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