Stomping their feet and cheering as loud as they can, more than 6,000 baseball fans will converge on Ricketts Park for the biggest night of baseball of the year in the Four Corners.

Farmington’s greatest spectacle, the American Amateur Baseball Congress Connie Mack World Series, is set to begin Friday with three games to open the nation’s most prestigious tournament for players 18-and-under.

Teams from across North America and Puerto Rico will compete in the 12-team, double-elimination tournament with college and professional scouts tracking every pitch.

No team in the tournament draws as big of a crowd as the host team. After battling through a nine-team city tournament to determine the hosts of this year’s series, Farmington-based Strike Zone Baseball claimed the city championship for the sixth time in the last seven years.

Though the team is mostly made up of New Mexico talent, three boys from La Plata County and another from Montezuma-Cortez are on the roster.

Kelton McCoy of Bayfield and Lawrence Mayberry of Durango are two every-day players for Strike Zone, led by former professional player Adam Morrissey of Australia.

While starring at their high schools, Mayberry and McCoy have spent the past three summers competing for Strike Zone, and they experienced the CMWS in 2014.

“Being 16 and playing in front of 6,000 fans was nerve-racking,” McCoy said of his first CMWS experience. “I’m more confident now. We’ve played against this level of competition, and we know what we’re going against this time.

“I’m still a little nervous. If you aren’t, something is wrong with you.”

McCoy, who said he is looking forward to Friday’s downtown parade through Farmington, spends time catching and pitching for Strike Zone. He is the team’s clean-up hitter and has emerged as a leader of the club.

“Kelton has been a prodigy kid,” said Strike Zone assistant coach Damion Lovato. “He came in as a sophomore and didn’t get much playing time. He stuck with it and is now one of the biggest leaders on the team. We look to him to drive in runs, and in the city tournament he did it on the mound and behind the plate for us.”

McCoy used his experience with Strike Zone to get noticed by college scouts, and he will play at the University of New Mexico next year.

Mayberry, who will play at Seward County Community College in Kansas next year, is the team’s shortstop and uses his speed to score a lot of runs from the top of the team’s batting order.

“Lawrence came in the same way Kelton did, and he’s never been afraid of adversity,” Lovato said. “He faces challenged head on no matter what the scenario. He competes at the plate, and we can depend on him defensively. His attitude has gotten him to the next level. People talk about his size (5-foot-8), but he’s our bulldog.”

Also on the Strike Zone roster is Durango’s Kyle Duran. Though he doesn’t seem many at-bats, Lovato said Duran is an integral part of the team’s chemistry.

“He’s a team player and knows his role,” Lovato said. “When he gets time to shine on the field, he does his best. He can roam the outfield as well as anyone, and that’s huge for us.”

Mayberry and McCoy experienced the agony of missing out on the CMWS in 2015 when Strike Zone was beat by the 4C-Club Sox of Farmington. The two teams met in the opening round of this year’s city tournament and again in the city tournament championship game. Strike Zone won 4-3 in the opener and 5-1 in the title game to earn host honors. McCoy had a key RBI single in that win after Mayberry sparked a rally by reaching on a fielding error.

Strike Zone was upset in the second round of the tournament by the Rivercats, a team made up of developing Piedra Vista High School players. McCoy credited that loss for waking the team up in time to still win the double-elimination tournament.

“We’ve definitely had our ups and downs and went through some hard times,” said Mayberry, son of George and Tonya Mayberry. “We had a lot of losing early and felt adversity, and I feel like we overcame our troubles. It brought us together.”

McCoy, son of Derek and Loresa McCoy, said the goal all summer was to avenge last year’s defeat in the city tournament.

“(Morrissey) let us know in April when we got together that we weren’t going to feel that hurt again like we did last year when we watched the Club Sox host,” McCoy said. “That drove us all year.”

Also on this year’s host team is Andrew Laymon of Cortez. He pitches and plays left field.

“Of course there’s going to be some nerves, but I’m just ready to experience it all,” Laymon told The Journal. “It’s going to be a great time, and I’m looking forward to it.”

The host team comes with plenty of pressure but low expectations. Going into its 52nd year, the CMWS has never seen a host team win the championship. Teams from Aztec, Bayfield, Bloomfield, Cortez, Durango, Farmington and Gallup compete every year for a spot in the tournament, but even winning one game in the CMWS is considered a successful year.

This year, it won’t be easy for Strike Zone. They will open play at 7:30 p.m. Friday against the West Region champion SoCal Renegades, winners of the 2012 CMWS and the 2013 runner-up. A loss would drop Strike Zone into the loser’s bracket Sunday night, while a win would advance the team into Monday night’s winner’s bracket.

“There’s no better way to set the tone on opening night that to play one of the best teams in the tournament,” McCoy said. “It’s the kind of night where we can take a team like that down. We won’t be afraid of a big team. Just because they’re from California doesn’t mean anything. Hopefully that’s the night we slay the dragon.”

jlivingston@durangoherald.com