Athletics 10 Riggers 6
The last time the Red Deer Riggers faced the Fort Saskatchewan Athletics they were able to dig themselves out of an early hole and go on to win the provincial senior AAA baseball championship.
In that instance they trailed 4-0 before storming back to win 6-4.
On Wednesday the hole was simply to big to get out of, as they fell behind 8-1 after two innings and dropped a 10-6 decision to the A’s in the deciding game of the best-of-three Sunburst Baseball League final at Great Chief Park.
“It was a big hole,” agreed Riggers manager Curtis Bailey. “When I made the pitching change (in the second) I glanced back and thought to myself what an ugly scoreboard.”
James Dykstra started for the Riggers, and after coasting through the first inning, lost his curve and his control in the second inning as the A’s scored eight times.
He only managed to get one out and was nicked for seven runs on six hits and a walk. Brent Lazzarotto came on and before he could find his rhythm allowed a pair of hits and a run.
“I expected Brent to be a little sore early on as he hasn’t thrown for a couple of weeks, but once he loosened up he threw well, until tiring,” said Bailey. “As for Dykstra he seemed to be aiming the ball a bit and leaving a lot of balls in the middle of the plate. It was like batting practice. But those things happen.”
With Lazzarotto calming things down the Riggers tried to make a comeback, scoring five runs in the fourth inning to narrow the gap to 8-6. They also had runners on second and third, but Kiel Vertz got Jason Chatwood to hit a sharp grounder to first for the final out.
The Riggers were missing Jaret Chatwood, Denver Wik and Kerry Boon out of his starting lineup as they returned to school in the States. Both Shayne Court and Joel Peterman leave today to return to Minot State in North Dakota.
All five will be back for the national final, beginning next Thursday in Dartmouth, N.S.
“I think the fact we were missing three of our top players affected us a bit, you could feel it in the room,” added Bailey. “But the guys we had on the field battled hard and there was no quitting. No one got frustrated and started blaming anyone else, which is good to see in a team.”
Wednesday was the fifth time the Riggers faced the A’s in the provincials and league final, and they won three of the games — twice in the provincials.
“We certainly wanted to win this, as you always want to be successful, but in the end we won the bigger prize,” said Bailey, who felt the team may have been looking ahead a bit.
“I think they were all thinking about next week and we weren’t mentally focused as we should have been.”
The Riggers scored once in the first inning — an unearned run against starter Karnie Vertz, then got to Kiel Vertz for all five runs in the fourth. Matt Davis had a bases loaded walk with Peterman lining an RBI single, Court a two-run single and Matt Fay added sacrifice fly.
The A’s scored their final two runs in the eighth off of Lazzarotto on two hits and a walk after two were out.
“I could see Brent was beginning to tire the inning before, but we just hoped he’d get through one more,” said Bailey.
Colin Hodgson worked a scoreless ninth.
Fay, Chatwood, Bailey and Court had two hits each. Matt Beaudry had three hits and Ben Herman two hits and two walks for the A’s.
• The Riggers have added Stags right-hander Davin Gulbransen and Jeff Hall of Calgary for the nationals . . . James Fischer threw the final three innings of two-hit ball for the save.
drode@www.reddeeradvocate.com