The U12 Sox softball team pictured here with their provincial championship banner. (Submitted photo/Davin Hildebrand)

By Martin Martinson

Softball Supremacy

U12 Sox claim provincial gold in Prince Albert

Jul 27, 2021 | 12:15 PM

The Meadow Lake Sox U12 softball team had a weekend to remember at provincials in Prince Albert, winning gold in the A-North division.

The highest level of provincial competition for their age group, the win served as Meadow Lake’s first provincial appearance in softball in over a decade, with the team winning all but a single one of their six games on the weekend on their road to the top of the podium.

The team opened their tournament Friday with a 4-3 win over the Saskatoon Phantoms. Saturday the Sox then continued to roll with an 11-0 win over the Saskatoon Hustlers Grey Team before falling 1-0 to the Melfort Spirit in their final pool contest.

In the quarterfinals, the Sox bounced back to top the Saskatoon Hustlers Green Team 12-1, before also topping the host PA Aces, 5-2 to punch their ticket to the finals.

In the gold medal game, the Sox would get another crack at the Melfort Spirit — their lone loss of round robin play — this time topping their rivals 8–2 to claim the provincial championship on the weekend.

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Head coach of the Sox, Davin Hildebrand said he and his coaching staff couldn’t be more proud of their team for what they accomplished this year, and all the hard work they put in that led to the success.

“We’re really happy for the girls; we’ve got a good group here who have been working together for a few years now, and they’ve been going to pitching clinics and hitting clinics and putting in a lot of time trying to get better, which really paid off,” he said. “They played so well and they’re very coachable and they work hard, so we were really proud of them and happy for them to see the success that they did.”

For Meadow Lake, this is the community’s first softball team that’s even gone to a provincial tournament in many years.

Hildebrand said he hopes the Sox’ success this year can continue as the U12 team gets older, and help encourage the next generation to get involved in softball as well to continue to revitalize the sport in the community.

“We’re excited about this group and we hope we can keep them together for a number of years,” he said. “It would be great to see some of the young girls that get to watch this team think to themselves they might like to play softball too, and work hard at pitching and catching and hitting, to see softball stay strong in Meadow Lake for a number of years.”

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Martin.Martinson@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @MartyMartyPxP1