Championship baseball is back in the five boroughs.
The Brooklyn Cyclones — the High-A affiliate of the Mets — captured their first South Atlantic League championship on Tuesday night with a 2-1 win over the Hub City Spartanburgers to complete a sweep for the club’s third overall title in franchise history.
It marked the first for the Cyclones since they made the move to the full-season South Atlantic League in 2021 in conjunction with the restructuring of Minor League Baseball. They last won in 2019 as a short-season team in the now-defunct New York-Penn League.
“This one lined to left field. Waiting on it is John Bay, and this whirlwind ride of a 2025 season has come to its final destination,” Cyclones broadcaster Justin Rocke said on the air for the final out. “Your Brooklyn Cyclones, 2025 South Atlantic League Champions!”
The title capped a strong season in Brooklyn that saw the Cyclones amass a franchise record 72 regular-season wins and sweep their way through the playoffs, knocking out the Greensboro Grasshoppers in the divisional series before downing the Spartanburgers in two games to take the title.
The Cyclones’ two runs in the Tuesday clincher both came in the top of the third inning after Bay, the left fielder, kicked off the frame with a triple before shortstop Marco Vargas and DH Matt Rudick delivered run-scoring singles.
The Cyclones used six different pitchers over the course of the night, combining to yield just one run on five hits. They struck out 11 batters.
Hub City’s Rafe Perich drove in its only run of the night in the eighth inning with two outs, but Brooklyn reliever Brett Banks worked his way out of a bigger jam with the Spartanburgers threatening to tie the game with two outs and the bases loaded.
Banks managed to get Antonis Macias to ground out to short in a five-pitch at-bat to end the threat.
Right-hander Dakota Hawkins was credited with the win for the Cyclones, pitching 2 ⅔ innings of relief while allowing a run on one hit and striking out four.
Hoss Brewer got the save with a perfect ninth inning where he struck out two.