The Unity Panthers U19 softball team recently returned home from Westerns in Richmond, BC with a bronze medal. They won provincials on their own home turf to secure their spot in the Westerns tournament, and played well enough against the best-of-the-best to get a chance to play on championship Sunday.
Doug Rutley is one of the coaches for the team that dons Unity colours, but is made up of talented players from around the area.
"I believe there are 7 girls from Unity. One Leipzig girl. A Wilkie girl, a Biggar girl, and a Macklin girl."
The first day started off great for the team even though they closed things out with a loss. Entering Friday with a 2-1 record, they would unfortunately lose two close ones to put them into a must win situation on Saturday.
"The girls did really well, pulled together and we ended up winning three games on Saturday," said Rutley, "The girls played flawless defense, and their bats were incredible. There were highlight reel catches in the outfield, and they did everything us coaches asked them to do so we could play on Sunday."
On Sunday they took on a team from BC for a chance to make the gold medal game, but a lack of timely hits led to the end of their season in a 6-2 loss.
"The girls played a great game. All of us coaches were certainly proud of them because they did everything we asked them to do," said Rutley who talked about the end of the road now, "For the majority of this group it will definitely be the end for them. They have had a really good run, most of them have been in on numerous provincial gold medal wins, and a bunch of them actually have bronze from Westerns a few years ago."
Rutley along with partner in crime Denelle L'Heureux will likely be a little sad to see it all end.
"Denelle and I have been coaching these girls off and on since their first year of ball, and both of our daughters are second years so they are done minor ball now. It is the end of the road for us, and what a great way to end it was with the bronze medal."
Switching over to L'Heureux, she shared some comments back after their provincial win on just how long most of the squad has been together.
"I think it was provincial win number five for them. Doug and I got super lucky with this group. Athletic, no ego, just a great group that clicks all the time and we were so lucky to have this group to coach growing up."
There must be something in the water for Unity ball players as a certain mix of talent and passion sticks around in some kids as they grow up, evidenced by the Panthers, and the Unity Jr Cardinals baseball team who are on a similar path that you can read about below:
Sat, Apr 20, 8:30 AM
