The Yorkton AA Mosquito Cardinals Baseball team completed their season at the Saskatchewan Baseball Association provincial finals July 15- 17 at Swift Current.
The successful season began with interest very low to compete in the Regina Baseball division with only five players committing to play in this league. A compromise was made to have interested players move up into an older Pee Wee division to compete in the Parkland Baseball division. With nine mosquito age players along with a handful of Pee Wee age boys, this team lost in the league final 11-10 to the Yorkton Team 2 ball team.
The Mosquito AA team competed in the Melville AAA tournament . Playing with only 10 players for most of the weekend the team played against the top AAA teams from Regina and Saskatoon. Their first game, Yorkton played against the Regina White Sox. With the score at 4-2 for Regina in the bottom of the fifth inning; Regina was able to score 6 runs to break the game wide open. The second game of the weekend was against the winners of the Saskatoon league, the Saskatoon A's. In a very tight defensive game, Saskatoon came on top 5-3.
The third game of the tournament pitted the Cardinals against the Saskatoon Braves. It was another tight game. The Cardinals came out on top 6-3 with strong pitching from Reid Perepeluk in relief.
The win gave the Cardinals third place in their pool. Sunday morning saw an enormous pitching display by Gregor Farquharson who pitched all four innings against the Regina Little League AllStars and striking out 12 batters in a shortened "mercied" game.
Offensively the Cardinals were led by Braden Kitchen who went three for three at the plate and Jordan Repsch who had a three run home run in the bottom of the first inning. The win placed the Cardinals into the B-final against the Saskatoon Braves. The Cardinals came out quickly, scoring five runs in the bottom of the first inning, but the strong Braves pitching shut down the Cardinal bats for the remaining of the game while their team rallied for a 9-5 Braves win.
The July 15-17 weekend saw the Yorkton AA Mosquito Cardinals participate in the Saskatche-wan Mosquito AA provincials in Swift Current. The Cardinals opened with an uncharacteristic lacklustre performance on Friday's opening game against Lloydminster. Dylan Novak started on the mound followed by Tanner Melnychuk and Reid Arnold. The Lloydminster prevailed, claiming a 13-3 win. Saturday proved to be the day the Cardinals turned things around. Their first game of the day pitted the Cardinals against the Martensville Mustangs. Dylan Novak again started pitching for the Cardinals for two and two thirds innings and was relieved by Brett Kemp who totally dominated the Mustangs the rest of the way as the Cardinals went on to win 15-5.
Offensively the Cards were lead by Kitchen who went three for three as well as Taphorn who belted a key two run double. The win gave the Cardinals home field advantage in their next game against the same Martensville team. The winner would move directly into Sunday's semi-final while the loser would be relegated to play against the Lloydminster team.
A loss would definitely be a strain on any team, as it would be the third game of the day. The Mustangs came out hard against the Cardinals starting pitcher Farquharson.
The turning point in the game came very early in the top of the first inning with to Mustang runners on base and two out a hard line-drive was hit to right field but the Cardinals right-fielder Reid Arnold made an unbelievable over the shoulder ice-cream cone catch to snuff out the Mustang attack. The defense was solid throughout the game for the Cards.
To maintain the pitch-count and have pitchers available for Sunday's semi-finals; the Cardinals utilized Farquhar-son, Keenan Taphorn, Perepe-luk, and Kaeden Taphorn for 25 pitches each and closed out the game with Kitchen.
Offensively the Cards were led by Farquharson with a triple and double; Jordan Repsch with a triple and Arnold who broke the game wide open with a timely RBI single. Third-base coach Monte Taphorn had the Martensville off balance with calling for aggressive base stealing and timely bunting. The final score was Yorkton 7, Martensville 1.
With the Saturday's win the Cardinals placed second in their pool and were forced to play the Swift Current Indians, first place finishers in the other pool. This game was undoubtedly the "best" game of the tournament. The Cardinals opened the scoring in the top of the first inning with runs scored by Kitchen, Keenan Taphorn and Farquharson. Farquharson started on the mound and shut down the Indians for one and two thirds innings when the Indians scored one run in the bottom of the second inning and two more in the bottom of the third. The 3-3 tie continued into three extra innings, until the Indians scored one run in the bottom of the ninth inning to claim the win.
Farquharson pitched four and two thirds innings and was then relieved by Keenan Taphorn closed. The interest in the game was evident as crowds increased around the diamond with every extra inning played.
The Swift Current coach commented to Yorkton Cardinals coach, Larry Kitchen, that this game was probably the A-Final game. Swift Current claimed the Provincial title with a 15-2 win over Weyburn.
Hopes are that the core of these Mosquito players continue to participate in baseball and hopefully can bring a PeeWee title back to Yorkton.
The team was coached by Larry Kitchen, Monte Taphorn, Greg Andrychuk and Rick Perepeluk.
