OTTAWA – The final leg of the Baseball Canada National Championships got under way today with the Senior Men and Peewee divisions. The Peewee championship will see some added strategy as a new pitch-count rule is in effect for pitchers.
At the Peewee Championship in Vaughan, Ontario, the final game of the day between Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan was suspended due to a malfunction with the lights on the field and will be completed on Friday.
As for the rest of the schedule, all games were completed on time which was mostly high scoring affairs.
Québec opened their tournament with a pair of lopsided wins, first by a score of 11-1 over Alberta, then a 24-6 drubbing of Prince Edward Island.
The host team from Vaughan also went undefeated on day one the Peewee Championship with an 11-7 win over Prince Edward Island and then outlasting New Brunswick by a score of 15-11. The Ontario came out on top in their lone game of the day, a 14-0 shutout of Newfoundland & Labrador.
In other action, British Columbia defeated New Brunswick 10-0, Nova Scotia crushed Newfoundland & Labrador 19-4 and Saskatchewan trampled Manitoba 14-3.
At the Senior Men’s Championship in Brandon, Manitoba, Rob Mancini (Windsor, ON) got a two-RBI pinch hit in the bottom of the sixth inning to lift Ontario over Alberta by a score of 2-1.
Ontario 2 was not as fortunate as British Columbia would jump out to a 5-0 lead and hold on to win by a score of 6-3. Jon Bosnick (Burnaby, BC), Steve Bailey (Victoria, BC) and Lance Burrows (Victoria, BC) all scored a pair of runs in the game.
Buddy Mayert (Brandon, MB) was 3-for-3 with two runs and an RBI in a losing cause as his Manitoba team would fall to Nova Scotia by a score of 9-5. Nova Scotia scored four runs in the top of the seventh to take this tightly contested matchup.
In other action, Québec went 2-0 to open the tournament with a 3-1 win over New Brunswick and a 7-3 victory over host Brandon. Nova Scotia would also jump to 2-0 with a 6-2 win over Newfoundland & Labrador in their second game. Newfoundland would not fair any better in their second game as they would fall to British Columbia by a score of 5-3.
Click here for complete Baseball Canada National Championships coverage.
