It was a heartbreaking weekend for the top seeded Innisfail Indians.
The Indians were in Lacombe for the senior mens AA Parkland Baseball League semi-finals tournament Aug. 5 to 7 when they had their playoff hopes dashed.
“We lost in the semi finals (and) didn't make it to the final (championship) series,” said Jay Kirkham, assistant coach of the Innisfail Indians. “It was disappointing.”
Innisfail led the five-team league all season and went into the semi final weekend tournament sitting in first place with 12 wins and 24 points.
“We definitely came into the weekend with higher expectations but it didn't work out,” said Kirkham of the upset. “The teams we played against played really well and the Innisfail team had an off-weekend. We definitely didn't come to the diamond with our best baseball games.”
Despite starting the tournament in the win column against Airdrie early Saturday afternoon (Aug. 6), the Indians faced some tough competition during the three-day tournament, from both the second seeded Red Deer Razorbacks and the third seeded Lacombe Dodgers.
“We lost to Lacombe on Saturday afternoon and then we lost to Red Deer on Sunday,” he said, noting the tough loss to Lacombe. “They actually beat us quite badly and beat us by 10 runs.”
Red Deer and Lacombe will face each other in the three-game championship series later this month.
Kirkham said despite a couple of new teams and faces in the league this year, the regular season was a good one.
“Overall the top end of the league was pretty even between the three (top) teams (Innisfail, Red Deer and Lacombe),” he said. “We split games and we came into the (semi final) tournament as the number one seed. We just didn't have the weekend we needed to have.
“The season for the most part would be one of our most successful seasons in recent memory,” added Kirkham. “We played pretty steady baseball and played well all year round. It's just that we finally ran into some cold bats on the weekend when it mattered.”
The Indians finished the season in third place overall, just as they did at the provincial championships, which they hosted in July.
Kirkham said although Innisfail didn't come out on top this year, they have much to be happy with. He said the Indians are a close group of guys who will now focus on the off-diamond aspects of the game in the off-season.
“We'll do some team building over the winter months and we'll wait until next spring,” said Kirkham. “We'll use the underachievement of this year to help fuel the fire to win next year.”
Jay Kirkham, assistant coach
"The season for the most part would be one of our most successful seasons in recent memory. We played pretty steady baseball and played well all year round."
