Sask-Alta Baseball League celebrates 75 years with playoffs on Sunday

Over the league’s history, there have been 44 teams to take to the field, but only one constant: the Richmound Rockets.

Four other teams also played in 2026: the Swift Current Yard Goats, Cabri River Rats, Gull Lake Greyhounds, and Climax Cardinals.

Winning the League Pennant was the Yard Goats with a 9-3 record.

The Climax Cardinals missed the playoffs on a tiebreaker with an identical 5-7 record with Gull Lake and Richmound to finish the regular season. Cabri was just ahead of that group at 6-6.

The season will wrap up with a four-team playoff at Mitchell Field in Swift Current on Sunday, July 26.

The fourth-place Rockets play the first-place Yard Goats at noon, and the third-place Greyhounds take on the fourth-place River Rats at 3 p.m.

Winners of each game will meet in the league final at 6 p.m.

Heading into the game, the Yard Goats are the defending league champs, while the River Rats have won five of the last seven titles handed out.

The Rockets last won the league in 2023, and the Greyhounds’ last title was in 2003.

Overall, Richmound has nine titles, Cabri has five, Swift Current has three, and Gull Lake has one.

The playoff MVP will be determined on the weekend, but a few league awards have already been handed out.

Jesse Duchscherer of the Richmound Rockets had the best batting average with .667 and was also one of seven players to lead the home run race with two on the season. Others to hit it out of the park twice included Rockets teammate Austin Ward, Cabri’s Kyle Svenson, Brody Alexandre, and Hayden Johnson, Swift Current’s Brock Wall, and Gull Lake’s Braden Sumner.

The league’s top pitcher award went to Swift Current’s Danon Funk, who went 2-0 with an identical 1.24 earned runs average and walk plus hits per inning pitched. He had 26 strikeouts through 17 innings pitched.

Winning the Grant Ehnisz Memorial Award for outstanding dedication and sportsmanship in the Sask-Alta Baseball League was Curtis Arndt, a former member of the Golden Prairie Demons.

The league’s teams are entirely in Saskatchewan now. But over the years, just over half of their teams have come from Alberta.

Medicine Hat has a strong history in the league with 17 different teams taking the field.

They include the Athletics, Bisons, Black Sox, Blue Jays, Bucs, Cardinals, Chinooks, Elks, Hot Shots, Logomotives, Red Dawgs, Sidewinders, Superiors, Tigers, Vipers, White Sox, and Yankees.

The last active Medicine Hat team was the Vipers, who folded during the 2019 season.

The last team from Medicine Hat to win a league title was the Scoreboard Blue Jays in 2014.

In total, Medicine Hat teams have won the league 13 times, second only to the community of Leader, which has 14 wins, with 12 as the Barons and two as the Expos.

Leading the way with the most wins for Medicine Hat were the Athletics with five, followed by the Scoreboard Cardinals with three (2005, 2002, 2001), Sidewiders with two (1999, 1998), with one title each were the Scoreboard Blue Jays (2014), Superiors (1960) and Hot Shots (1957).

Other Alberta teams to take the field over the years include the Acadia Valley Dodgers, Hilda Cubs, Oyen Eagles, Redcliff Red Sox, Schuler Tiger Cats, and Walsh Mercuries. Schuler won the first league title in 1951, and Walsh won in 1956.

Former Saskatchewan teams include the Burstall Braves, Eatonia Royals, Eston Ramblers, Fox Valley Lions, Golden Prairie Chinooks and Demons, Hazlet Elks, Horsham Flyers, Kindersley Raiders, Leader Barons and Expos, Maple Creek Cardinals and Mohawks, Mendham Monarchs, Prelate Mustangs, and Shaunavon Badgers.

In the league’s history, a title was not handed out only three times: 2020, 1976, and 1969.

by Jesse Gill

Sask-Alta Baseball League celebrates 75 years with playoffs on Sunday

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