Little League World Series

The Little League World Series is an annual baseball tournament by Little League Baseball for children (primarily boys) aged 10 to 12 years old, held in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Originally called the National Little League Tournament, it was later renamed for the World Series in Major League Baseball. The Series was first held in 1947 and is held every August in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania; while the postal address of the organization is in Williamsport, the Series itself is played at Howard J. Lamade Stadium and Volunteer Stadium at the Little League headquarters complex in South Williamsport.

Initially, only teams from the United States competed in the Series, but it has since become a worldwide tournament. The tournament has gained popular renown, especially in the United States, where games from the Series and even from regional tournaments are broadcast on ESPN. Teams from the United States have won a plurality of the series, although from 1969 to 1991 teams from Taiwan dominated the series, winning in 15 out of those 23 years. From 2010 through 2017, teams from Japan similarly dominated the series, winning five of those matchups.

While the Little League Baseball World Series is frequently referred to as just the Little League World Series, it is actually one of seven World Series tournaments sponsored by Little League International, in different locations. Each of them brings community teams from different Little League International regions around the world together in baseball (four age divisions) and girls' softball (three age divisions). The tournament structure described here is that used for the Little League Baseball World Series. The structure used for the other World Series is similar, but with different regions.

In the summer months leading up to the Little League World Series, held each year in August, Little Leagues around the world select All-Star teams made up of players from each league. It is these All-Star teams that compete in district, sectional and/or divisional, and regional tournaments,^{[citation needed]} hoping to advance to Williamsport for the Little League World Series. How many games a team has to play varies from region to region. In the United States, the tournaments at the lowest (district) level lack nationwide standardization. Some use pool play or double elimination, while others use single elimination.

In the United States, the fate of district winners varies widely from state to state. In some larger states such as Pennsylvania, New York, and California, the district winners advance to one of many sectional tournaments. The winners of each sectional tournament then advance to a state or divisional tournament, the latter only being held in Texas and California and are similar to the state tournaments held in less populous states. Most smaller states lack competition at the sectional level and go straight from district to state tournaments. A handful of states are composed of only one district, and the district champion is the automatic state champion.

With two exceptions, every state as well as the District of Columbia crowns a state champion, and sends that team to represent it to one of ten regional tournaments. The exceptions involve California and Texas. Because of their large geographic and population sizes, California and Texas send two representatives to their regional tournament; Northern California and Southern California in the West region tournament and Texas East and Texas West (whose areas encompass more than the geographical areas of East Texas and West Texas, splitting roughly along the I-35/I-37 corridor) compete in the Southwest region tournament. Up through 2018, the Dakotas had one district spanning the two states, and its winner became the joint champion when advancing to the Midwest region tournament. However, beginning in 2019, North Dakota and South Dakota are represented by individual teams in the regional tournament — creating an odd number of teams first in the Midwest Regional and then (beginning in 2022) in the Great Lakes Regional.

The state champions (as well as the Northern California, Southern California, Texas East, Texas West, and District of Columbia teams) compete in one of ten different regional tournaments (increasing from 8 in 2022). Each regional tournament winner then advances to the Little League World Series. A comprehensive breakdown of current and historical US regional tournament locations, participants and results is available online. Since the geographical boundaries of the District of Columbia are exactly the same as the capital city of Washington, this District is usually identified specifically as "Washington, DC."

Other countries and regions pick their own way of crowning a champion. Little League Canada holds tournaments at the provincial and divisional level to field six champions (four provincial and two divisional) at the national tournament: Alberta, Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, the Prairie Provinces (Saskatchewan and Manitoba), and the Atlantic Provinces. The host site of the national tournament varies from year to year, and the host team gets an automatic berth as the seventh team. The tournament is played as a round robin and uses the Page playoff format. The winner of the national tournament earns the right to represent Canada at the Little League World Series.