I guess this means the final will finish on episode 50 and 51 will focus on the celebration and Meiji Jingu tournament. Season 3 will start with the winter training camp and New Year's. I think they will have to take a break or post recap episodes for a while, because there will be only 28 chapters after the season ends and that's not enough to continue the anime. 

Those will actually be covered by the 5th OAD including the final chapter of Act I. OAD 4 will cover "Comeback" and Jun's sidestory. :)  Should there be a S3, it will most probably start with Koshien. :)

Dang. It will be a really long break since they have to wait for new chapters every week and animate them, hire voice actors.

Yes, its going to be a long break for now, even the OADs are kind of a little long of a wait o_O'. But looking forward to more animation of such awesome series. :)

Does anyone who read the manga, know why the coach didn't let sawamura pitch the last inning? 

Sigh, that really hurt :(

Here's what I think the reasons are. The coach probably doesn't trust Sawamura closing important games because of what happened in the summer final. Another reason is Furuya really wanted to play and Kataoka was the ace of the team and he remembered their conversation in the car and he probably would say the same thing to his former coach if he was in the same position as Furuya so he considered his feelings.

I agree with everything you just said except for the trust issue. I don't think Coach Kataoka distrusted Sawamura to pitch the last inning as much as he wanted to finish with his ace and give Furuya his chance to pitch. I think that settling the game with a successful relay of all of Seido's pitchers was something left undone from the summer final. If you recall in the summer, he tried to finish with ace Tanba before he was taken out due to leg cramps.

From an American baseball perspective, it makes perfect sense to use a pitcher like Furuya as a closer, especially in a clutch situation like that where K's are the ideal and you don't have to worry allot his pitch count or stamina.

Look at the 2014 Kansas City Royals' closing weapon "HDH," which is a late-game three pitcher relay of Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis, and closer Greg Holland. It was tweaked in 2015.

In a 2015 ALDS game, Herrera took over in the 7th for Cueto, who only allowed a two-out single. Ryan Madson took over in the eighth, and Wade Davis got the save in the 9th.

This is still anime, so it was probably to let Furuya play, but if you coach based on statistics, keeping Furuya as a closer would be the way to go, but I have no idea how, or even if, Billy Beane and Moneyball affected Japanese baseball.

ETA: opening day is next week, so we at least have real baseball to tide us over in the meantime.

I've been enlightened The pitching change makes even more sense when you justify it with real-world facts :-) Thanks