Team Is Home--Beat but Far From Defeated

Geoff Ebdon, still keyed up from the Big Series, had apparently lost none of his appetite. He ate breakfast in Pennsylvania and then, somewhere in the air between here and there, he also downed French toast, cereal, bear claws and an omelet.

After 18 straight victories, the Irvine Northwood All-Stars had dropped the world championship Saturday to Hua Lian, Taiwan, by a score of 21-1, the most lopsided defeat in the history of the Little League World Series.

Now, the 12-year-old center fielder, whose heroic efforts at least put them on the boards in their last disappointing game, was home, and he was tired.

Surveying the crush of friends, relatives and reporters surrounding the team at midday Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport after their flight from Pennsylvania, Geoff sighed. “We wanted to win it since we went that far,” he said. “But it’s been great, and now I want to get home and rest.”

Scored Team’s Only Run

Ebdon, who stole home for Northwood’s only score in the final game, said the team lost because they played poorly. “We knew we didn’t play our best,” he said. “We beat ourselves.”

Nonetheless, Geoff and his teammates held their heads high as they walked into the lobby and a blaze of television lights and chants of “Northwood, Northwood.” And why shouldn’t they? After all, they’re No. 1 in the United States.

“You can’t top this--best in the U.S.A.,” said a smiling Bob Garcia, their team manager, as he scanned welcoming banners on the walls behind LAX’s Gate 7. “This is great, just great.”

Most of the kids were pretty worn out after the pressure and constant media attention during the past week in Williamsport, Pa., where the world’s eight best Little League teams played for the championship, he said.

“You’re sort of in awe of that attention,” Garcia said. “Now they’re just tired and want to get home to their folks.”

At least 100 of the Irvine team’s die-hard fans who didn’t make it to Williamsport were on hand to greet their young heroes at the airport, waving signs and throwing confetti.

“We just couldn’t be prouder,” said Dianne McAlister, grandmother of first baseman David Lambert and known to the team as “Nanny.”

Nanny’s husband--”the kids know him as ‘Mac,’ ” she said--literally dropped in on one of the team’s qualifying games earlier this summer in San Bernardino. He came in by helicopter.

“He was stuck in Costa Mesa,” McAlister said. “David looked up in the skies and then grinned at me in the stands. I nodded. He knew who it was.”

McAlister said the boys didn’t seem too disappointed Sunday, mostly worn out. Besides, she said, they have a lot of other things to look forward to. “If true to form, they’re probably looking forward to getting home to surfing, football and playing video games,” she said.

Team manager Garcia, who is retiring after 20 years working with Little Leaguers, was in an upbeat mood as he shooed the team downstairs to match boys and their luggage. His boys were the greatest, of that he was certain.

“On their day, they can beat anybody,” he said with a big grin. “These guys could play the (Los Angeles) Dodgers on a (Little League field), as long as they didn’t start (pitcher Fernando) Valenzuela.”