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Trailing by a run and down to their last out in the bottom of the ninth inning, the Prairie Baseball Academy Dawgs spoiled an upset in the making with two straight seeing-eye singles to defeat the host Okanagan College Coyotes 5-4 in the Canadian College Baseball Conference championship game at Elks Stadium on Sunday.
Cory Scammell’s single to right field drove in Crush Wheatley from second base to tie the game, while Matt Malec’s harmless-looking ground ball found a hole between second and third to score Layne Currie from third base with the winning run. Both Wheatley and Currie had also singled off losing pitcher Mitchell St. Laurent, playing in his final game in an OC uniform.
The victory earned the heavily favoured Lethbridge-based PBA Dawgs (22-6 in the regular season) their sixth straight CCBC title and left OC still looking for its first national championship.
Despite being outhit 11-5 in the game, the Coyotes made the most of their five singles after falling behind 2-0 after two innings.
A single by OC catcher Brock Chilton led off the third inning, while a wild pitch, a walk and a sacrifice fly by Logan Wedgewood all contributed to the Coyotes cutting PBI’s lead in half.
OC took the lead in the fifth inning with three runs on a two-run single by Liam Wyatt, two walks and a Dawgs error while the Dawgs replied with a single run in the sixth on two hits — a double by Dustin Braun and a run-scoring single by Nick Ankerman.
Brett Flemming started for the Coyotes, going five full innings, scattering five hits and giving up two earned runs, while St. Laurent allowed six hits — four of them in the ninth inning — and struck out five in his 3 2/3 innings of work.
PBA earned its berth in the championship game by going 4-0 in the five-team round-robin, while the Coyotes, 2-2 in preliminary play, defeated the University of Calgary Dinos 14-9 in semifinal play earlier on Sunday.
More details and photo gallery to come . . .
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