The Yorkton Cardinals came up short in the Saskatchewan 'AA' Provincial Baseball finals, but they walked off the field with their heads held high.
"It has been a fantastic year," said Cardinals head coach Mike Farquharson. "To make it to the championship game, what more can you ask for. There were eight teams all over the province this weekend and three club teams in our division and we made it to the championship game."
"If someone would have said it at the beginning of the year that we would make it to the finals against Humboldt, we would have taken that in a blink of an eye," added assistant coach Larry Kitchen.
The Cardinals fell to the Humboldt Dodgers 11-4 in the championship game of the Jubilee Park-based tournament this past weekend. Yorkton put in a strong effort, but the Dodgers star pitcher, Tyler McWille, was just too much for them to handle.
"Humboldt had their ace on the mound and if it would have been anyone else we probably would have been right there until the bitter end," said Farquharson. "We came out and gave it our best shot."
The Cardinals' pitcher, Kaden Taphorn, meanwhile, stood his ground in the big game.
"(Kaden) Taphorn gave us 80 some pitches and played really well for us," said Farquharson. "What more can you ask for from your pitcher. I'm very happy with how he played."
Farquharson believes his young squad, made up of Grade 7 and 8 students, let their butterflies get the best of them at times.
"We had jitters right off the bat and I don't think we shook off that feeling," said Farquharson. "That stuff happens sometimes. They are young kids."
After four innings of play, it started to rain heavily and a delay followed. It seemed the game might have to be stopped there because of the weather, but luckily the rain let up the kids finished off the match.
"We had organizers and volunteers that were able to facilitate any kind of weather," said Kitchen. "We worked through it and got over the rain."
Before making it to the championship game, the Cardinals won their three round-robin games and knocked off Lloydminister 12-2 in the semifinals of the playoff action.
"We got very lucky and we were able to save our pitchers in those games," said Farquharson on his team winning all four games on the 12-run mercy rule. "Our goal was to save as many of our pitchers for the final game. You have to be happy how we played in our first four games. The whole team contributed and made some great plays out there."
In a community of roughly 19,000 people without a midget baseball team, the Cardinals head coach hopes the peewee club's success helps attract more Yorkton youngsters to minor baseball.
"We hope there are more kids coming out next year and the year after," said Farquharson. "It's a tough sport to play, but a fun sport to play. It would be nice to see it grow in Yorkton."
