SUNDRE – The U18 Stealers baseball squad wrapped up their regular season in the Chinook Baseball League on a high note.
“We ended up finishing tied for first in the league, so pretty proud of them there,” said coach Shawn MacNeil.
Olds Black tied alongside the Stealers for first place in the league, which this season had a total six teams in the U18 division.
Including a previous home tournament above and beyond regular league play, the Stealers had an overall season record of 10 wins, two ties and two losses, said MacNeil.
“I thought we had a really good season this year,” the coach said. “The kids really learned a lot; came a long way from the start of the season.”
Yet certainly not as a result of lack of skill or ability, the team did not go on to compete in provincials as a full roster could not be fielded, he said.
“We had a pretty good team to go into provincials,” he told the Albertan.
“It’s just really tough with the schedule that they have set up for provincials to get the commitment for three full weekends in a row when guys are going on vacation and got jobs; it’s just too hard to make it work.”
Asked where the team shone this past season, he said, “Our pitching was really strong all year long, I felt.”
Although their defence tended to lag a bit behind pitching and would fluctuate between good and bad games, batting was fairly consistent all around, he said, adding the team would average in the vicinity of 12 to 15 runs a game.
“So our offence was good too,” he said.
Looking ahead to next year, MacNeil said he plans to coach for at least one more season.
Responding to a question about what he might have in mind to focus on during practice to prepare next year’s team for another successful season, the coach said that will depend on whether there will be a full roster.
“We have four players this year I believe that aged out,” he said.
“That only leaves us with eight left over, so hopefully we’ve got some coming up so we can field a team next year.”
