The 100 Mile 'N' Hour Peewees came home with bronze medals after competing in the B division at the Under-14 2013 Provincial Softball Championships in Richmond, July 19-21.
Coach Greg Parent says the team faced a number of odds going into the tournament, but played hard and never gave up.
Short a pitcher, they brought along 100 Mile House U12 squirt division pitcher Tanner Hooper to help. Tournament rules prohibited players from pitching more than three innings each game, so when games went seven innings, Hooper was put on the mound.
“He did really well,” Parent says, adding Hooper pitched at least one inning in most of the games. “He's going to be a good ball player.”
Mitchell Hooper and Trevor McMahon are the team's main pitchers and Parent says they played very well.
He adds another challenge the first-year peewee team faced was being heavy with 13-year-olds, which put them at a disadvantage with the many second-year teams whose majority of players were 14 years old.
“They have more players to pick from (in the larger centres). We only had three 14-year-olds on our team.”
A case of jittery nerves among most of the players was also a factor, Parent says. Even when they were down several points, he adds, they still played hard and kept trying.
“They had a lot of compliments from the umpires for playing so hard. They had a lot of close games.”