Braves silver finalists at Wallaceburg tournament

Nobleton's Beverley Berger, a blind hiker, enjoyed a day on the Bruce Trail recently.

The Wanderosa midget Braves travelled to Wallaceburg for a tournament over the Canada Day weekend.

A Saturday morning game was played against Komoka. The Braves came close to a shutout with the only Komoka run scoring not until the sixth inning.

Jeff Thompson was the pitcher for the entire seveninning game. Nine opposition batters went down on strikeouts. Infielders Curtis Braun, Adam MacDonald and Luke Ratcliffe threw several runners out at first base on grounders and left-fielder Jonathan Conte had a excellent catch to end an inning. Any runners that did reach base were thrown out on stealing attempts by the catcher duo of Jeff Vickers and Braun.

The Braves capitalized on many Komoka errors with the first three batters Ratcliffe, Vickers and Cody Renzetti all scoring. Conte hit an RBI single. Aiden Long reached base three times and scored twice with Vickers earning an RBI. Vickers scored a second time when Thompson reached base on a fielding error. The Braves won with a score of 6-1.

The afternoon game was played against Petrolia. It was a tight game with the Braves only able to score two runs. Ratcliffe scored the first run on a single by Renzetti and Patrick Oatway was given a free pass in the fifth inning when Renzetti took a bases loaded walk. Vickers had an additional single but was left stranded.

Braun pitched six innings and struck out five batters. MacDonald came in to finish the sixth inning by getting the third out. The fielder's defensive play kept the runs to a minimum but Petrolia was able to pluck away scoring single runs in four of the six innings, enough to take the win 4-2.

A win and a loss was enough to send the Braves to the silver medal semifinal game. They faced a team from Kincardine and needed a win to continue on.

Vickers scored the game's first run getting on base with a walk, moving bases with hits by Renzetti and Thompson and coming home on a wild pitch. Thompson was the starting pitcher for the Braves and saw an equalizing run score in the first inning before a relay from Ratcliffe in centre field to MacDonald to Andrew Reid got an inning ending out at third base.

The Braves went ahead in the third inning with a double by Thompson who then scored on a single by Reid. Ratcliffe took over pitching in the fourth inning and saw just one more run score in the four innings pitched. Five strikeouts and great defence kept more runs off the board. Ratcliffe hit a single in the seventh inning followed by Vickers who got on base with a fielder's error. Renzetti, up next, brought both runs home with a double to end the game's scoring, giving Bolton a 4-2 victory.

The Braves' final game of the tournament was against Wyoming for the silver medal prize. Bolton got off to a shaky start and five Wyoming runs were able to score in the first inning. Braun was starting pitcher and struggled to find the umpire's small strike zone. MacDonald took over to pitch through the second inning and Renzetti went to the mound in the third. The opposition had quite a few solid hits and by the end of the fifth inning Wyoming had 12 runs. Long came in to pitch the final two innings and one more run was scored.

The Braves struggled with the bats and were no match for the Wyoming offence. Vickers had the most success hitting a triple and two singles with two RBIs and scoring twice. Renzetti had two singles with an RBI. Thompson and Braun each had singles. Conte and Long, both on base with walks and Oatway, who was hit by a pitch, all made it home safely to bring the final score to 13-5 in Wyoming's favour.

The Braves did well to become the silver medal finalists finishing fourth out of 12 teams.