The Western Major Baseball League have released its 2011 schedule, and the Weyburn Beavers will have 42 regular season games to play.
The Western Major Baseball League have released its 2011 schedule, and the Weyburn Beavers will have 42 regular season games to play. Already the executive of the Beavers have started their recruitment for the season, with commitments from head coach Terry Smith and assistant coach Gord Gateman.
The Beavers open the 2011 regular season on the road with a game in Melville on Friday, June 3. Their home opener is scheduled for the following night, Saturday, June 4, when they face their eastern division rivals, the Yorkton Cardinals. All home games for the Beavers are played at Tom Laing Park.
The season is split evenly into 21 home games and 21 away games. Price information on season tickets will be released by the Beavers in January. The best-of-five games playoff series for the League will begin on Saturday, July 30.
During their 2010 season, the Beavers qualified for the Western Major Baseball League playoffs for the first time since 2003. They lost in the first round of the playoffs three games to one against the Regina Red Sox.
The Beavers have been members of the Western Major Baseball League for eight years, and prior to that had played in the Southern League. In the WMBL the Beavers play in the East division along with Melville, Regina and Yorkton. Other divisions include the West and the Central, with teams from Edmonton, Lethbridge, Medicine Hat, Okotoks, Moose Jaw, Saskatoon and Swift Current.
This will be the third year for Smith as head coach, who had first come to Weyburn as the assistant coach in 2008. While no official release has been made of player commitments, Smith had previously mentioned he expects to have several veteran players on the 2011 team.
As for assistant coach Gord Gateman, this will be his first time on the bench, but is no stranger to the team. Gateman had pitched for the Beavers in the 2008 and 2009 season. Since then he has become quite familiar with the community, as he has relocated to Weyburn.
The Weyburn Beavers have been playing baseball since 1932, at which time they were with the Southern League. Tom Laing Park, previously known as Harvey Field, has been the home of the Beavers in that time.
Once in their history had the Beavers accomplished a national victory, when they won the 1996 Senior 'A' Baseball Championships in 1996. They were later elected into the Saskatchewan Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006.
