That’s a wrap

Hockey is over and St. Louis is no longer singing the blues! The Raptors win it all too. Never thought I would be a fan of basketball, but I did watch some of it and it was quite exciting. Happy for the city of Toronto and the whole country. Happy for the Blues too. Good old Canadian boys came through!

It’s half the way through June and the ball season is almost done too. At least for the house league teams. This coming weekend all the Lakeland Minor Ball teams will be playing somewhere. Should be chaotic as usually. Parents with more than one player splitting up and going every which way and even some of them relying on the grandparents to transport them to the games. Trying to supply enough umpires to cover the whole league is a challenge that every association faces.

We are hosting the Peewee baseball finals. Twelve teams are committed to coming. Plus our own boys.  Come down to the diamonds to check out the action and cheer the Sox on.

This past week our Peewee boys lost for the very first time this season to St. Paul, The final score still a very respectable 10-9. ‘Top Gunner’ Crawford, ‘Bo Diddley’ Fontaine, Tray Calliou and  the ‘Mighty Casey’ Warawa taking on the pitching duties. The pitching was fine but the boys were a little weak on the sticks.

Three out of five innings the boys didn’t score a run, and in fact watched the third strike instead of going down swinging. Overall, one bad game out of eight is  pretty good in my books.

The Bantam girls have a big win this past week against Lloydminster. Paige Scarson and Sadie Baker sharing the pitching duties doing a fantastic job. Paige throws a wicked fastpitch. Sadie is like a changeup. Her pitch was slower, but she always throws strikes so she relied on the fielders and they did a good job of getting the outs. Sadie also coming up with a monster home run.

This past weekend we hosted the Softball Alberta Provincial Playdowns . Rylee ‘the Rocket’ Warawa and Kaylee ‘Big Bird’ Radcliffe playing for the Bonnyville Angels defeated the Lloydminster Liners two game out of three to advance to the Provincial Finals in Carstairs on the July 1st weekend.

In Bantam Boys Provincial round robins Tyler Warawa and the Northstars travelled to Fort Saskatchewan this past weekend winning all three games. The Northstars  finished in first place in Division one with  a 9 win 2 loss on the season and will end up in Tier one for the next round and the Provincial finals.

The team played two games in Ft Sask on Saturday and one game in Leduc on Sunday. The first game on Saturday they played the host team Ft Sask. The home team threw their best pitcher at the Stars and he pitched really well only giving up four runs over five innings. However the Northstars starting pitcher Brent Hoshowski wasn’t to be out done and had a great outing pitching four innings only giving up one run and striking out seven.

Izaak Warholik came  in and pitched the final three innings and only gave up three runs, striking out five. Our lead off hitter Nolan Dechaine crushed the ball all weekend, he has done a terrific job leading off this year. The Northstars ended up winning 8-4 which put them off to a good start.

It was right back at it to play a very tough team in Grand Prairie. The Stars squeaked out a 9-6 win last time they played GP and this game was no different. This was one of the most exciting games they have played.

GP held the lead for most of the game. Seth Cobourne started pitching and although didn’t have his best stuff he battled through three innings and kept the game close. He has been one of our most reliable pitchers all year. Andon Ballas came in to face the heart of the order and gave up a few hits, but he made up for it with his bat going 2-2 with a double and a single driving in two runs. Colton Lacoursiere has become a really reliable outfielder for the team and also went 1-2 at the plate. The back and forth game continued all the way to the end.

The Northstars being the home team were down 9-12 in the bottom of the 7th. However with the way the boys can hit the ball we are never out of a game. The top of the order came up and started hitting the ball hard, then Zach Lapointe stroked a double down the line to cash in two runs to tie the game. 12-12, two out with a runner on second. Zach gets a great jump and steals third, just beating the throw. With the close play the ball found a way through the players and Zach came home on the throw for the walk off victory. A huge win for the boys as GP is one of the top teams in N1.

After two big wins the team headed out to watch the Edmonton Prospects and do a little team bonding to end a great day of ball.

Sunday was a long day as the Northstars didn’t play host Leduc until 3pm. The game was definitely one to forget for the Northstars, they weren’t ready from the start. Keegan Locke started the game and is one of the most consistent strike throwers on the team. He has also moved up the lineup this year becoming a reliable hitter. Kobe Warawa played well defensively again this weekend and had a great game at the plate going 2-3 and cashing in two RBI’s. But for the most part the only excitement started in the top of the 7th. The Northstars were down 7-6 with one out.

First year Kamden Brunet came in and delivered on of the biggest hits he had all year with a drive to left field for the single. A much needed base runner. Finally after all day of waiting for the bats to come alive they exploded. Evan Gauthier rocked a triple to the right field fence to score a couple runs. After pounding the ballin the top of the 7th Evan came in and closed out the bottom of the 7th not allowing any runs and letting the Northstars walk away with the 12-7 win.

Not the prettiest win, but a wins a win. The Northstars finish 9-2 for first place overall in N1.

Baseball Alberta combines the North and South for the month of July and re-tiers all the teams. The Northstars will be in Tier 1 with 7 of the best teams in AA. With 42 teams slugging it out for top spot this is quite an achievement for this group, but they deserve to be there .  The games only get harder and they are going to have to play their best to compete with the best teams in Alberta.