The first one made them champions. The second one put them in a special conversation. The third one made them elite.

When the Eau Claire Bears beat the Haugen Knights on Sunday, they took their place at a very small table on the state's amateur baseball scene.

That day, they won their third Wisconsin Baseball Association championship in five years, making them only the seventh team in the tournament's 61-year history to win it three times.

"We knew that a team hadn't done that for a really long time," said Reed Pecha, the Bears' second-year manager. "We knew that, if we could win our third one, that would put us in with more of the elite teams in WBA history."

They did. Convincingly.

With a 12-1 victory over the Knights on Sunday in Haugen, the Bears defended their 2008 WBA title and became the first team to win the tournament in consecutive summers since the Hayward Hawks did it from 1981-'83.

"It's a good group of guys," said Bears infielder Scott Wolfe, a 1998 Eau Claire North graduate. "We're all friends. We enjoy playing baseball together. The winning's just an added bonus."

The Bears, who also won a WBA title in 2005, made some Chippewa River Baseball League history in the process. Making their seventh consecutive WBA showing - and sixth in the finals - they became the first team in CRBL history to win back-to-back association titles.

After being tested against some of the WBA's best amateur pitchers during the CRBL season, the Bears team that took off under former manager Scott Biederman put an exclamation point on its progression Sunday.

"You really don't think about that, but, gosh, you start winning all these league championships and making it to the WBA six years in a row, it kind of starts to set in," said Matt Lunde, also a '98 North grad and the ace of the Bears' pitching staff. "It's been a fun ride."

After going into the WBA tournament with a 22-5 record and their fifth CRBL title in six years, the Bears outscored their final five opponents 44-12 - and seven of those runs against came in their one-run victory over Taylor County in their first game at regionals.

Much of the Bears' success springs from their pitching staff. In Lunde, Jon Huth and Kelly Werner, they have a rotation few other WBA teams can match.

"We're a perfect team for a tournament like this ... because we've got pitching," said Wolfe, who was named the defensive player of the tournament in his ninth season with the Bears.

Lunde, the staff's No. 1, shut out Rib Lake in the WBA semifinals. Huth, one of the team's most experienced players, pitched in the minor leagues and has thrown two CRBL no-hitters. Werner, who also pitched in the minors, allowed one run in seven innings to win the WBA title game.

"That is a big part of these tournaments," said Lunde, who has pitched eight seasons for the Bears and spent three with the Eau Claire Cavaliers. "If you can get to that final game, it's nice to have that third guy that can come in and throw."

The Bears' roster is loaded with players who have connections to Carson Park - every one of them graduated from Memorial or North - and the names haven't changed very much. Their core group - mostly between 23 and 30 years old - has remained in place for about half a decade of CRBL and WBA success.

"We do a lot of stuff together," Pecha said. "The wives get along really well, and people enjoy being in each other's company. When you have that, you develop great relationships beyond the baseball field.

"We're a good group of friends and a pretty good group of baseball players too."