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Blues win Servus Credit Union Tournament, Monarchs lose consolation game

Jun 4, 2018 | 6:46 PM

 

MEDICINE HAT, AB – A return home for the Medicine Hat ‘AA’ Moose Monarchs squad over the weekend, playing their first home games of the year at the annual Servus Credit Union Tournament.

Eight teams from across Alberta and Saskatchewan gathered at Athletic Park and Jeffries Park to battle for the first American Legion tournament title of the season.

Despite finishing the round-robin with a 2-1 record, the Monarchs were relegated to the consolation bracket after the Calgary Redbirds and Regina White Sox finished with better run differential.

That meant a matchup against Saskatchewan’s Southeast Twins to close out the tournament on Sunday afternoon.

Medicine Hat fell into a 4-0 hole early in the second inning, but were able to score five runs of their own in the third to take a 6-4 lead.

After the Twins cut the deficit to a single run, Medicine Hat struggled with errors and allowed six runs in the fifth inning to fall into an 11-6 hole.

Jack Suhai drove in a pair of runs in the sixth and the Monarchs pressured late with the bases loaded, but the Twins shut down the home side to take the contest 11-8.

Suhai said they weren’t able to recover after allowing those six runs in the fifth inning.

“A couple of errors here and there, errors kill you,” said Suhai. “They hit the ball that inning, crushed it, I think they had three or four doubles that inning. So, there’s not much you can do other than take care of the ball, take the outs when they give them to you, and not give them any extra outs.

Starting pitcher Ashtyn Street was credited with the loss after allowing four earned runs on seven hits, as the team gave up six errors over the course of the afternoon.

The Monarchs are in Kalispell, Montana over the upcoming weekend for three games against the Lakers.

In the championship game on Sunday, it was the top two seeds meeting up with the Calgary Blues hitting the diamond against the Lethbridge Elks.

After a slow start, the Elks took a 2-0 lead with runs coming in the third and fourth innings.

Waking up in the fourth inning, the Blues came alive with six straight runs to take their first lead of the game 6-2 heading to the fifth.

Lethbridge scored a single run off a pass ball in the sixth to make it a three-run game, but Calgary proved to be too powerful with another six-run inning.

Relief pitcher Brayden Otto saw a Lethbridge high fastball and smoked it as part of a three-run shot to put the game out of reach 12-3.

Otto said he simply swung for the fences once he saw the fastball leave the pitcher’s hand.

“I wasn’t too sure off the bat it would be a home run, so I just started to run hard,” said Otto. “I just saw a fastball high and in, I put a good swing on it, and luckily it went over the fence.”

It was a rough weekend meanwhile for the K of C Knights, as they dropped all four of their contests stateside against the Lewistown Redbirds and Havre North Stars.

Losing seven of their first eight games of the season, the Knights will try to stop the bleeding on Friday for a pair of games against the Tri County Cardinals at Jeffries Park.