Yellowknife didn't have a team at any of the three host venues for this year's Slo-Pitch National Canadian Championships but there were players on teams from outside the city.
And they came close to winning a title on Aug. 6.
Tehnille Gard, Shandie LaBorde and Brian Couvrette were on the ground in Leduc, Alta., one of the host sites for this year's championships. Couvrette and Gard played with the Bomb Squad co-ed outfit from Bonnyville, Alta., that played in the Co-Ed D Signature Series event. The Signature Series differs from regular co-ed play in that different size balls are used based on which gender is batting.
“I met them at last year's nationals through (former Yellowknife resident) Dana Gard and her boyfriend,” said Couvrette. “They asked me to play and I jumped at the chance.”
They started off well enough, going undefeated through the round-robin with four wins from four games and won their first two playoff games before losing in the semifinal, a really bad loss, according to Couvrette.
That meant they had to take the long route to the final. Being that it was a double-knockout tournament, they still had one life left but managed to stave off elimination in their next game and made it into the final, where they had to knock off the RDI Reapers of Blackfalds, Alta., twice in order to win. They did the business in game one to set up the decider, which ended up going to extra innings.
“Once we lost the first game on the Monday, we knew we had to tighten things up and we did,” said Couvrette.
The international tiebreaker is used once a game goes to extra innings, meaning a runner goes to second base to start the extra inning but the batting team also starts with one out. The Reapers managed to push their runner across in the top half to take a one run lead but the Bomb Squad couldn't match it in the bottom, making the final 12-11.
“It sucks when you lose any final because you always think about what you could have done differently,” said Couvrette.
While Couvrette was playing in just one tournament, Gard ended up playing in two. Both she and her sister Dana Gard played with the Rowdy Roses from the NWT in the Women's C division tournament, which included LaBorde on their roster. The Roses ended up finishing fourth in their division overall, not bad considering their eighth place finish in the round-robin.
If you include the games from both teams, Tehnille Gard played a total of 17 games over four days.
Rather exhausting to say the least.
“Physically and mentally exhausting,” she said. “It rained for the first two days and that ended up being the best two days because the last two days were so hot.”
It took a lot of work to get both sisters from game to game, a task made even harder considering there were three different complexes in Leduc where games were taking place.
“We'd finish one game, go to another, then another,” said Gard. “My dad was there and my sister's boyfriend's parents, they were all helping us out driving us and keeping us fed and watered and hydrated. It was a lot of support.”
There was one scary moment when the sisters had to leave in the midst of an extra-inning game involving the Roses and that caused nerves to fray a bit, said Gard.
“Dana and I had to go play with the Bomb Squad and we got worried that the other team would try and pull some sort of trick, especially in extra innings,” she said.
Thankfully, it didn't happen.
“You can't get any closer than we did with the Bomb Squad and I know the ladies were super excited to play on Monday, the final day,” she added. “It's a bummer not being able to finish it off in the co-ed but to push them to the limit was impressive and getting that far with a team that wasn't really familiar with each other was impressive also.”