Broncos up for baseball title defence

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This article was published 01/05/2019 (2488 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Boissevain Broncos won their third Prairie West High School Baseball League championship last year and are looking for a fourth title this spring.

It may not be as easy this time around though. The Broncos didn’t lose a league game last season and capped their run with a 4-0 victory over Russell’s Major Pratt Trojans, ending their two-year reign atop the circuit. However, three key players graduated, leaving Boissevain trying to replace shortstop Jared McCorrister, second baseman Mavrick Morrow and pitcher/centre fielder Tristan Racine. McCorrister is especially difficult to replace as he joined the Mayville State Comets, an NAIA team. He tore his ACL last week, ending his freshman campaign.

Now it’s up to players like Kyle Hole, Karsyn Fluker and Austin Clyne, once he returns from the Portage Terriers after their junior A hockey season is over, to step up and fill those holes in the middle infield.

Boissevain head coach Keith Forsyth is confident in their abilities and would like to push for the title and getting back to provincials, but he feels this year’s squad doesn’t quite have the depth of past teams.

“We’ll compete. We’re not in dire straights, but we’ve got new kids in positions and it’s how they react and fill in,” he said. “We’ll be fine. We’ve been dominant in Zone 9 for the last four or five years. I don’t see us being dominant, but I see us competing for the title.”

The Broncos do have a few advantages heading into today’s season opener in Killarney. The team has been practising for a few weeks and went down to Bottineau, N.D., for exhibition play. The team returns 10 players who were part of that undefeated run in league play and helped the squad reach the semifinals at provincials, where the Broncos lost 8-6 to the eventual champion Portage Trojans.

Boissevain also has a strong group of starters, especially on the mound with Hole, Clyne, Tyson Pringle and A.J. Strain expected to share the load. Pringle is especially valuable. Not only did the Grade 11 student throw a two-hit shutout in last year’s league final, but he also spent time on a provincial team last summer.

That quartet of pitchers, combined with the team’s work on defence and the leadership skills of Pringle and Tanner Clyne has created high expectations for the Broncos.

“Our strengths will be our pitching and defence,” Forsyth said. “We spend way too much on those things that it won’t be from lack of knowledge the mistakes we make. Our strengths will definitely be on the mound and how we play with the ball. Because we’re young, hitting is where we’re really going to have to improve.”

The Broncos will get a couple of new challenges this season as well. The league grew from 14 to 15 teams this season after Killarney and Wawanesa merged into a co-op team, while the Rivers and Ste. Rose-McCreary joined the circuit. This is the most teams in the Prairie West league since 2011 when it featured 16 squads.

That has caused the league to shake up the divisions, with Vincent Massey and Crocus Plains both moving from the North Division to the South Division, joining Boissevain, Reston-Elkhorn, Souris, Virden, Killarney-Wawanesa and Deloraine-Hartney. Birtle, Dauphin, Hamiota, Major Pratt, Shoal Lake-Strathclair-Rossburn, Rivers and Ste. Rose-McCreary will make up the seven-team North Division.

Each team will only play opponents in their own division once, meaning North Division teams will play six games while the South Division squads will play seven. The top two teams in each division will advance to the final four in Brandon on June 6.

Prairie West league president Paul Artz is happy to see the league growing.

“That’s a good sign for baseball,” he said. “A lot of people have kept teams going in communities and kids playing ball, it’s a testament to those men and women who worked hard to keep baseball alive. It’s nice to see it’s kind of coming back. If we can sustain what we have, that’s a bonus. We have to keep kids playing ball and have them interested.”

Artz believes that summer hockey was taking kids away from baseball, but the short high school baseball season combined with a chance to play with friends has helped boost schools’ numbers for the sport.

As for the Boissevain players, they’re a passionate bunch. They practice at 6:30 a.m., and are ready to visit the Killarney-Wawanesa Raiders in their season opener today at 5:30 p.m.

“You can only do so much in the gym. Batting practice, infield and outfield you can only take so far,” Forsyth said. “The kids are more excited than we are, and that’s a good thing. We hold practice at 6:30 and they have no questions or qualms about it, they just want to play ball. That’s the one thing about coaching kids in Boissevain, they want to play ball. They’re excited and eager and it will be fun to get going.”

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