MOOSEJAWTODAY.COM -- It wouldn’t be the Western Canadian Baseball League playoffs without a handful of upsets somewhere along the way, but it isn’t often the top two seeds in a division go out in the first round.
That’s turned out to be exactly the case in the East Division, though, as both the Moose Jaw Miller Express and Saskatoon Berries picked up victories in their opening-round series this past week.
The Express were the first to get through with their two-game sweep of the Regina Red Sox, taking a 4-3 win in Game 1 and a 7-6 victory in Game 2.
The Berries took an extra game to get things done, winning 6-4 win over the Mavericks in Medicine Hat before falling 3-0 at home and clinching the series Saturday with a 6-2 win in Medicine Hat.
As a result, Moose Jaw will face Saskatoon in the East Division Final, with Game 1 of the best-of-three series in Saskatoon on Sunday at 1 p.m. and Game 2 taking place in Moose Jaw on Monday at 7:05 p.m. Game three will be back in Saskatoon on Tuesday night.
The season series between the two teams was as back and forth as could be in the early going before the Berries took three straight wins over the Express and finished with a 5-3 record.
The teams split their first two games, with Moose Jaw winning 5-4 on June 4 at home and Saskatoon taking the rematch 11-8 on June 5. The two teams then went up to Saskatoon the next night, where the Express prevailed 16-10.
The series continued with a 5-4 Saskatoon win at home on June 9 and Moose Jaw took a 10-9 victory on June 25 for a 3-2 season series lead.
They then met three times in the final week of the season, with Saskatoon winning all three -- 5-3 on July 31 in Saskatoon, 5-4 on Aug. 1 in Moose Jaw and 4-3 and Aug. 5 in Saskatoon.
As for the postseason, Moose Jaw’s Austin Gurney is among the league’s offensive leaders almost across the board through the first round -- the veteran infielder leads the league with six runs batted in and is tied for the lead with four runs scored while also holding a .500 average, second best in the WCBL.
Nate Mensik also had a decent pair of games against Regina, hitting two home runs to tie for the league lead and knocking in three runs while hitting .375. Thomas Soto is tied for second among WCBL hitters with a .500 average, going 4-for-8 and scoring three runs in the process.
With an extra game under their belt, the Berries also had a few players with gaudy first-round numbers.
Carter Beck is the top hitter in the WCBL with a .615 mark that saw him go 8-for-13 with a pair of doubles and a home run, while Nolan Sparks is tied with Mensik after hitting a pair of round-trippers of his own.
On the mound, the Express had a quality start from Adam Christopher, who allowed three runs on eight hits over 6 â…” in Game 1 and has a 4.00 earned run average. Westin Walls had a solid outing of his own in Game 2, allowing four runs on five hits over five innings and holding a 7.20 ERA heading into the East Final.
Moose Jaw also had a trio of solid relief performances, as Takeo Cookson and Drew Sorrentino combined to pitch four scoreless innings and Ethan Merk allowed a single run in his two innings of work.
Saskatoon’s Michael Singleton and Nick Nolan each gave their team a quality start, with Singleton allowing a single run over six innings in their Game 1 win and Nolan three runs over seven innings in their Game 2 loss.
Even more impressively, their bullpen has yet to give up a run. Tyler Davis (three innings pitched), Cory Lawson (2 IP), Adam Beamin (2 â…” IP) and Colin Plain (3 IP) combined to completely shut down the Mavericks, with both Beamin and Plain recording five strikeouts in the process.
Things went pretty much as expected in the West Division first round, with the first-place Sylvan Lake Gulls sweeping the Brooks Bombers thanks to 4-0 and 4-1 wins.
The defending champion Okotoks Dawgs survived a scare against the Lethbridge Bulls by splitting the first two games 7-4 and 5-4 before scoring the series-winning run in the bottom of the 13th inning and taking a 4-3 victory in Game 3.
