After a rocky start, the Westlock Red Lions earned the consolation championship title at their home tournament, the newly christened John Golonowski Invitational, played at Keller Field June 6-7.
The Red Lions made amends for back-to-back losses to Provost and Cold Lake with a dominating performance in the ‘B’ finals on June 7, routing the Edmonton Indians 15-2.
Manager Adam Sawatzky said his team came prepared to win after a less-than-ideal performance in the round robin.
“After losing both games [Saturday] we wanted to come out and play some solid ball,” Sawatzky said. “We did that for sure. We had a lot of hits and a lot of hard hits.”
A number of Red Lions split pitching duties and only conceded two runs over six innings as the game was cut short by the mercy rule.
“Pitching was kind of a group effort. Pat Rains pitched his first innings of the year and did a great job,” Sawatzky said. “I’m pleased how we came out today — refocused.”
Sawatzky said the Red Lions were caught off guard by some slower pitching, but capitalized on some faster speeds in the consolation final.
“Definitely everyone had a solid approach today, not that we didn’t on Saturday,” he said. “We saw some guys that weren’t throwing very hard and you’d think it would be easier, but when we’re used to seeing a certain speed it becomes tough to wait and become a patient hitter.
“[Sunday] we saw some speed and it showed and we hit the ball pretty hard.”
In their tourney opener the Red Lions fell to the Cold Lake Cardinals 4-3.
“They’re a tough team, they’re a tournament team. This atmosphere — coming out and camping and playing all day on hot, windy days — they’re used to it,” Sawatzky said.
“It showed, and they knew what they were doing. We just weren’t able to get the hits when we needed them.”
In their second game, the Red Lions fell 10-6 to another tournament team, the Provost Combine Pilots.
“They knew what they were doing and we didn’t have our best that game,” Sawatzky said. “And they were able to get the win against us.”
Sawatzky said while he would have liked to have seen his club perform better, he was otherwise pleased with the weekend.
“We’ve been very pleased with the crowds. There’s been a lot of people out and it’s been a good atmosphere,” he said.
The Red Lions travel to Barrhead on June 10 to take on the Orioles in regular season North Central Alberta Baseball League action.
