Sooners sweep Wildcats
League champs playing well heading into clash with undefeated Dartmouth
Some sparkling performances from the pitching staff led the Sydney Sooners to two shutouts and a three-game sweep of the visiting Kentville Wildcats over the Canada Day long weekend.
The Sooners wrapped up the threegame home stand on Sunday with a 12-0 win over the Wildcats, who managed just three hits as Sydney’s Kenny Long went the distance on the mound. A day earlier, the home side captured the first game of a Saturday afternoon doubleheader with a 4-3 victory that saw Justin Brewer (2-0) throw a complete game. In the second game, Adam MacDonald and Reilly O’Rourke combined on a three-hit, 8-0 victory.
Sydney dugout pilot Jim (Rico) McEachern credited his pitchers for taking advantage of a somewhat depleted Kentville lineup.
“They were short a couple of key hitters, but our pitchers worked hard and stepped up,” said McEachern, who skippered his team to the Nova Scotia Senior Baseball League championship last season.
“They threw it over the plate and our defense played the way they should play – when we did get in trouble we seemed to get out of it with a double play.”
In Sunday’s triumph, Jordon Shepherd’s two-run homer was an exclamation point for Sydney’s offence. Saturday, it was Mike Tobin who registered four hits and drove in two runs, while Long swatted three hits and Cory Christie had a double and a single in the opener. In the second game of Saturday’s doubleheader, Shepherd had a double, single, drove in four runs and stole two bases, while Phil Brown hit a double and Tobin added two singles.
The weekend sweep over the Wildcats improved the Sooners’ win streak to four and pushed their record to 10-2, while the Kentville squad has now lost six straight games and sports a 5-11 mark in league play. While the Sooners closed to within one game of the league-leading Dartmouth Moosehead
Dry, McEachern said his team will have to be at its best when the two sides clash next weekend at Beazley Field.
“Dartmouth has a really strong pitching staff and have three or four guys they can throw at you in the rotation – they’re a complete team, so we have to play well and play our game if we’re going to be successful.”
And, by playing “our game”, the long-time bench boss is referring to his team’s speed and its running game.
“We love to run, and we challenge teams by pressuring their infields and their pitchers – we get more fastballs because we’re always running and as a consequence that’s an advantage to our batters,” he said.
“We had a couple of guys picked off in the first game of the series, but that didn’t slow us down – that’s our style and we’re going to win or die by it, it’s a big part of our game and we’re going to stay true to it.”
The Sooners play their next 10 games away from home over three separate road trips. This weekend’s three-game set against Dartmouth (10-0) will be followed by three matches in Halifax (4-5) the following Friday and Saturday. Then, on the weekend of July 21-22, Sydney will play a doubleheader in Kentville and another twin bill the next day in Truro against the Bearcats (2-13).
The Sooners next home game is against Halifax on Friday, July 27.