The Southeast Legacy Twins were not able to replicate their 2013 magic at midget AAA baseball provincials on the weekend in Saskatoon.
A year after reaching the provincial final and going to Westerns, the Twins fell just short of the playoffs, posting a 1-2 round-robin record.
The tournament was plagued by rain delays, with only one game being completed on Friday and more being pushed back the next day. The opening ceremonies were also cancelled.
As a result, all round-robin games were reduced to five innings and only one diamond was playable.
"Everybody was kind of in the same boat there. It wasn't the best thing, but the tournament (organizers) did a great job of making sure they could do what they could do," said Twins head coach Derek Wallace.
In their first game, which started Friday and ended with the fifth inning on Saturday, the Twins lost 6-0 to the Saskatoon Diamondbacks.
The Diamondbacks scored three runs in the third and fifth innings.
"We came out strong and then had two bad innings where we gave up three runs. We couldn't get the bats going in that one. We just had a couple of bad innings on the mound and on defence where we gave up those three-spots," said Wallace.
Brandon Hutt started on the mound for the Twins, with Austin Kuchinka, Chris Cooper and Dylan Hockley later entering in relief.
The Twins' next game on Saturday night was much better, as they edged the Regina Mets 4-3.
"We played one of our best games of the year. We had a couple of huge hits and were able to get the win.
"James Giroux pitched that second game and had a huge game for us. He really shut the Mets down to get us that win, and they needed that win too," said Wallace.
The Twins got on the board quickly, with two runs in the top of the first. Carver Krafchuk and Colton Gingras drew back-to-back walks and were then cashed in on a double by Hutt, who later took the mound in relief.
They added two more runs in the third inning on a Cooper single.
The Mets made it interesting with two runs in the fourth inning and another in the fifth.
Kuchinka threw a complete game for the Twins in their final game, but they lost 4-0 to the Saskatoon Giants.
The Giants did most of their damage in the first inning, with three runs, followed by another in the second.
"We had lots of opportunities to score runs, but we just couldn't get the one or two runs we needed to put us over the edge there," said Wallace, noting it was one poor inning that sunk the Twins.
There was still a chance for the Twins to play in a tie-breaker, but that ended when the Diamondbacks defeated the Mets on Sunday afternoon.
The Giants defeated the Diamondbacks 6-2 in the provincial final on Monday.
Although the Twins finished in last place in the Saskatchewan Premier Baseball League this year, Wallace said there was improvement in a lot of players.
"There was progression. You gotta be happy with that. We started the year really rough, but we got better as the year went on. I think we went into the provincials with the attitude that we could win it. The boys didn't go in feeling like we were an eighth seed team."
Kuchinka, Giroux, Krafchuk, Jonassen, Fitzpatrick, Bryce Burnett, Jonathan MacFarlane and Logan Hertes are graduating from the team after this year.
