The game was in hand for coach J. Ernie Chaves’s Tigers team on Saturday during the Martha’s Vineyard Little League championship game at Veira Park in Oak Bluffs, when one of his players hit a line drive foul ball that sent him scurrying for cover as he stood on the third base line.

Coach Chaves was standing only a few feet from the Cardinals’ bleachers when he did his little dance to get out of the way, and somehow in the process reached out and plucked the foul ball out of the air with his bare hand. The Cardinals were losing 12-1 at the time, but one fan couldn’t pass up the chance to rib the other team’s coach.

“I finally got one,” Coach Chaves said, before throwing the ball back to the umpire.

“It’s about time,” the fan called out. “It took you all season!”

“Yeah but who cares?” the coach responded. “I finally got one!”

In the end the Tigers would win 12-3, but the good-natured razzing seemed to capture the spirit of both the game and the league, where teamwork, hard play and respect for the other players is emphasized as much as winning and losing.

“It’s hard to root against the other teams, because you know those kids . . . you know their parents,” Coach Chaves said after the game. “The kids play sports together all year, they go to school together, they are friends off the field. I think everyone sort of supports everyone else . . . at least I hope they do.”

That doesn’t mean there aren’t dramatic moments in Little League.

The Tigers, for instance, advanced to the championship game after a thrilling come-from-behind win against the Athletics on Wednesday. The Tigers were down 4-0 in that game after only the first inning, but fought back to tie the game at 4-4 before winning on a walk-off, two-run homer by Andrew Wiley.

And it was a bona fide over-the-fence home run.

“In all my years of coaching Little League — and I’ve been doing this for many years now — I’ve never seen a walk-off home run to win a game. Never mind a walk-off home run to win a playoff game after being down four runs. It was awesome. That’s all I can say,” Coach Chaves said.

There was a little less drama in Saturday’s championship game between the Tigers and Cardinals, but still some strong play from both teams.

The Cardinals took an early 1-0 lead in the top of the first on an infield hit by Emily Turner, who was also the starting pitcher. She shut down the Tigers in order in the bottom of the inning, striking out shortstop Brett Mello and starting pitcher Kevin Cleary. The game looked like it might be a low-scoring pitchers’ duel.

Cleary shut down the Cardinals in the top of the second, striking out Brian Frost and Shay Sullivan, but the Tigers opened up things in the bottom of the inning after Wiley walked, Emerson Mahoney singled and Adam Bilodeau walked to load the bases.

Then Mitchell Chaves knocked in two runs with a double, Noah Hoyt hit a single to score another, and Cleary drew a bases-loaded walk to make it 4-1. Andre Wiley then singled to score a run, and then immediately stole second when he noticed nobody was covering second, allowing another run to score from third. The Tigers led 6-1.

After the Tigers’ Brett Mello drew a bases-loaded walk to make it 7-1 in the top of the third, the Cardinals made a pitching change. Tristan Araujo took over on the mound, Turney went to first, and they were able to get out of the inning without further damage.

The Cardinals threw out two runners at the plate in the top of the fifth, and were poised to get out of the inning without allowing any more runs. But Emerson Mahoney dashed away any hopes of a comeback with a bases-clearing double that put the Tigers ahead 12-1.

Before the Cardinals’ last at bat in the top of the sixth, coach Kris Lukowitz gave a pep talk to his players.

“Is the game over yet? No, of course not. We still have a chance,” he said. “So some things didn’t go our way today — big deal, that’s part of baseball. But we will have our turn at the plate, and I want you to leave everything you have on the field. Let’s go down with a fight.”

And they did, scoring runs on a triple by Austin Chandler and a ground-out by Nicholas Vukota to make the final score 12-3.

After the game Coach Lukowitz praised both teams. “We won two playoff games to get here, and we had to fight to win those games, so I’m just happy and proud of these players to get to this game. In those other games the hits fell in for us, and today we had hard-hit line drives that went as outs. But that’s part of the game.”

Earlier during the minor league championships, the Rockies beat the Orioles 5-0 behind a dominant pitching performance by Jack Sierputoski, who struck out 11 of the 12 batters he faced, and gave up only a single hit over five-plus innings. The Rockies scored four runs in the bottom of the first on eight consecutive walks.

Sierputoski likely could have pitched a complete game, but Little League rules, designed to protect young arms and make sure everyone gets to play, forced him to leave the game after he reached 75 pitches. He struck out the first seven batters he faced and didn’t allow a ball to be put in play until the third inning.

“Jack is bringing it today,” said one young spectator wearing a Rockies cap who apparently knew the young hurler. “I’ve seen him throw a lot of games, but I’ve never seen him throw this good.”