Strong pitching performances played a big part in the Olds Spitfires mosquito Tier 1 A team capturing their league's provincial championship on July 27.Mosquito Tier 1 A baseball includes players between the ages of eight and 11.Olds was the host team in the tournament, which ran from July 25 to 27, and the Spitfires were undefeated with a 4-0 record going into the championship game against the Slave Lake Heat on the afternoon of July 27.Logan Grover pitched three near-perfect innings for Olds, including a three-up, three-down third inning where he recorded a trio of strikeouts, and his opponent, Jacob Plouffe, did not allow a run on his watch during those innings.The Heat cracked the stalemate in the top of the fourth frame, however, when Kyle Campbell made it to first base on an infield hit.Hunter Macallem then executed a bunt that moved Campbell to third and, thanks to a bad throw from Olds' Rhett Miller, Macallem was able to reach second.After Slave Lake's Ethan Wedrid struck out, Lai Davis Gircux was able to cash in Campbell and Macallem with a hit up the middle.With the Heat up 2-0, Olds retaliated in the bottom half of the fourth inning.Taurie Hammer led off with a double and then Nick Cleland was walked.Hammer then stole third base.Catcher interference on the part of Macallem sent Miller to first after Cleland stole second.Hammer scored on a wild pitch, while Cleland moved to third and then Plouffe walked Olds' Charlie Wright to load the bases with no outs.Cleland came home when Plouffe walked Logan Ferner and that turned out to be the end of Plouffe's time on the mound, with Nathan Hartman taking over for the Heat.He hit his first batter, Olds' Brynlee Rice, sending her to first and cashing in Miller.While Grover ended up giving the Heat their first out on a fielded hit, he was able to send Wright home for the RBI, putting Olds up 4-2.Anthony Chatwood then hit safely to bring in Ferner.The inning ended with the Spitfires up 5-2.Chatwood came in to pitch for Olds in the fifth inning, relieving Grover, who earned seven strikeouts.Slave Lake sent up four batters in their part of the fifth inning, with only Plouffe reaching base.Chatwood struck out three Heat players in the frame and Hartman was able to strike out one Spitfire and force ground outs from Bryson Luft and Jackson Notley, in the bottom of the fifth.In the top of the sixth, it was do or die time for Slave Lake and Chatwood started the inning by striking out Eric Cardual before walking Landau Robinson.Campbell hit safely with a grounder to third and Wright was able to throw out Robinson at second base.Chatwood found himself in trouble, however, when he fielded a hit from Macallem and ended up with an error after a bad throw to first, allowing Campbell to reach third base.Wedrid then smacked a shot to the shortstop that allowed Campbell to score, making the game 5-3.Chatwood redeemed himself when Gircux hit the ball to the pitcher, who easily lobbed it to first for the out, the win and the championship.Although he kept his cool, Chatwood, 11, said he did feel pressure when he took over pitching in the fourth inning to keep Olds ahead.“But I was able to hold onto it.”He added he came into the rubber match with a simple strategy.“Just keep throwing strikes, do as best as you can,” Chatwood said.Olds' head coach, Jordan Cleland, said he didn't have to say too much to his team to wake up their bats in the fourth inning to respond to Slave Lake's two runs.“I said two runs, big deal,” he said. “We're a kind of team that explodes for four or five runs all the time and we exploded for five the very next inning.”He chalked the Spitfires' 5-0 record in the championship tournament up to a rigorous training schedule that started on April 2 before the snow melted, with the team using gymnasiums for practice.“These kids went minimum four days a week, often five times a week, practising, playing. We were beating most of the teams in our league quite handily so we went looking for competition against AA teams from St. Albert and Sherwood Park.”Cleland added he pushed his team hard all season and they responded well to the motivation.“They kept working because they saw the results,” he said.The Spitfires also exposed a “big lie” this season, he added.“And that lie is that they're just kids and just let them do whatever they want, fun, fun, fun. These kids, the harder we worked them, we did running, our signature, all year because we were the most aggressive base runner of any team we ever played against.”Cleland said he plans to return next season and expects the team to be even stronger since eight of Olds' 12 players were playing for their first year this [email protected]
