Northwood Little League offers play during two seasons each year - Spring and Fall.

The Spring Season begins in February and runs through May.  All divisions have a postseason championship tournament.  Upper division teams also have a chance to participate in the District 55 Tournament of Champions. After the conclusion of the Spring season, upper division All-Star teams are formed to participate in the Little League District 55 All-Star tournaments.

Fall Ball begins in early September and runs through mid-November.  There is no postseason tournament in the Fall.

FALL BALL and SPRING BALL COMPARISON

Fall Ball is primarily focused on instruction and player development and is generally less of a time commitment and has fewer formalities (e.g., team photos, trophies, and tournaments) than the Spring season to keep the fees lower. In general, Fall Ball has a more relaxed environment compared with the Spring Season.

Games in Fall also are scheduled to attempt to avoid conflicts with other traditional Fall sports.

PRACTICE LOCATIONS & SCHEDULE

Practices occur on weekdays at local neighborhood grass/dirt fields within the NWLL boundaries as assigned by the City of Irvine.  Practice start times are from 4pm to 7:30pm (earlier times are for the younger, lower divisions), and are not determined until after teams are formed. The team manager will set the day and time for team practices based on his or her practice field allocation and personal availability. Because of this, we are not able to honor requests to be placed on a team with a specific practice schedule.

GAME LOCATIONS & SCHEDULE

Weeknight games usually start at either 4:30 – 5 p.m. or  7 p.m. As with practices, we schedule earlier games for the younger, lower divisions. Saturday games typically start between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. The City of Irvine determines and allocates fields to NWLL. A list of fields within the NWLL boundaries can be found on our fields page. The exact schedule will be released after teams have been formed.

Northwood Little League's home fields are at Hicks Canyon Park.  In some seasons, we do interleague with other Little Leagues within District 55, and so there are occasions where games will be played on fields outside of the NWLL boundaries.

GAME LENGTH

The length of the game varies by division:

• Ice Cream Tee Ball: 1 hour or 3 innings, whichever comes first.
• Tee Ball: 1.5 hours or 5 innings, whichever comes first.
• Rookie: 1.5 hours or 6 innings, whichever comes first.
• A Ball: 1 hour 45 min or 6 innings, whichever comes first. No new inning shall be started after 1 hour 45 minutes from the scheduled start time.
• AA: 2 hours or 6 innings, whichever comes first. No new inning shall be started after 2 hours from official start time.
• AAA: 2 hours or 6 innings, whichever comes first. No new inning shall start after 2 hours from the official start time or 15 minutes prior to the next scheduled game on that field, whichever is sooner.
• Majors: 6 innings. There is no time limit on games unless a scheduled game follows. When a scheduled game follows, no new inning can start 15 minutes prior to the scheduled time of the following game.
• Intermediate: 6 innings. There is no time limit on games unless a scheduled game follows. When a scheduled game follows, no new inning can start 15 minutes prior to the scheduled time of the following game.
• Juniors: 7 innings. There is no time limit on games unless a scheduled game follows. When a scheduled game follows, no new inning can start 15 minutes prior to the scheduled time of the following game.

RAINOUTS

In case of inclement weather, the City of Irvine updates the status of all athletic fields by 3 p.m. for youth sports use. Weekend updates begin at 7:30 a.m. and as conditions change. If the city closes a field, all games or practices on that field are cancelled. Upper division games will be rescheduled. There are no makeup games for Tee Ball, Rookie or A Ball. Field conditions can be checked at the website.

GAME SCORING

During the spring season, we do keep score at all games in the Intermediate/Majors/AAA/AA  divisions, to determine division champions and post-season tournament participants. Because Tee Ball, Rookie and A Ball divisions are instructional and intended to teach kids the fundamentals of baseball in a safe and fun environment, we do not keep score at these games, except during the Northwood end-of-season tournament. Game scores and summaries will be posted on the league’s web site and will occasionally be published in the Irvine World News.

No score is kept at any division during Fall Ball.

TROPHIES

All Tee Ball, Rookie, and A Ball players will receive a trophy at the end of the spring season. For all other divisions, only the division champions as determined by regular season record or Final Two playoffs will receive trophies. Winners of postseason tournaments will receive medals.