U13 Magic growing as a team

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This article was published 10/06/2025 (209 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When head coach Adam Hartman looks at his under-13 Westman Magic squad, he sees a group of players eager to improve.

“It’s a lot of fun working with these girls,” Hartman said. “A lot of them are very talented softball players but they’re also very talented athletes in many different sports. You can definitely tell they’ve been coached before. They’re hungry to learn and get better.

“It is a huge jump going from U11 to U13 AAA because the talent in this league is high. Every team has good pitchers and good hitters.”

The Manitoba Premier Softball League squad is comprised of Brandon’s Brooke Hartman, Bryelle Simard, Ellena Hermenegildo, Ayven Chuchmuch, Logan Rome and Kiara Spratt, Lenore’s Demi Hodson, Oak Lake’s Meredith Masson, Waywayseecappo’s Dasia Tanner, Hamiota’s Brielle McGonigal, Glenboro’s Hailey Davidson and Deloraine’s Braylee Merritt.

The only returnees from last year’s squad that hosted the inaugural western Canadian championship are Hartman, Rome and McGonigal, with Simard serving as an affiliate player last season. The 12-player roster is comprised of 11 major players in their second season of eligibility in the age group, and the rookie Hermenegildo.

The Magic (10-6) sit in second place in the seven-team league, trailing the unbeaten Interlake Phillies (14-0), who have superstar pitcher Kardyn Reimer.

“Four of our losses have been to the top team in the league,” Hartman said. “They have a pitcher who is remarkable. She’s incredible. We’ve pushed her twice, losing 4-2 once. We’ve gotten to her and made them sweat and proved to ourselves that we can beat them, we just need to beat them at the right time.”

The other losses came to third-place Central Energy in what Hartman considered an off day.

“We’re right there in competing for a gold medal and that’s what we’re going to push ourselves to try and do,” Hartman said.

The Magic lead the league with 168 runs for. Their success at pushing runs across comes from their approach at the plate and on the base paths, where they steal an incredible number of bases.

“Our whole lineup, one through 12, is putting up quality at-bats,” said Hartman, whose team began training indoors in November. “We can go 0-2 and fight back and get into a 3-2 count and foul a few off. We’re being tough outs for pitchers, which is always nice.

“We spent a bunch of time in the winter practices working on our sliding and trying to improve our base running times from base to base. We’re aggressive. When we get on base, we’re frequently stealing and taking extra bases every chance we can get.”

The Magic have used four pitchers, Hartman, Rome, Simard and Masson, with McGonigal doing the lion’s share of the catching. Merritt and Chuchmuch also catch: Another catcher, Davidson, is dealing with a displaced fracture in her finger from an injury suffered during practice in May and is out for a few more weeks.

“That’s been a strength of ours,” Hartman said of his hurlers. “The four girls we have throwing are all very good. We walk a couple here and there but for the most part we’re making other teams hit it and earn their way on. We have a nice mix, and we also have girls who can throw their changeups. Some are throwing them at any point in the count, and we have some girls who throw very hard for our age group.”

Anyone who has coached that age group understands they’re riding a defensive roller coaster, with errors virtually assured at some point. Hartman said his team has been strong in that regard, although an initial error can cascade into problems.

“We’ve looked really good at times,” he said. “We spent a lot of time training over the winter and we were able to build from the ground up in a lot of ways, and that allowed us to feel pretty prepared to start the season and it showed. In our first couple of weekends, we may have gone four or six games without making an error and looked really good.

“We at times show our age and our experience: It seems like when we make an error or two, sometimes it affects our confidence and one mistake will compound into another.”

He said the girls have made some highlight-level plays and he’s proud of their work in the field overall.

Hartman, who is well known for coaching the varsity girls basketball program at Crocus Plains after an outstanding hoop career of his own at Brandon University, is joined on the Magic bench by the ideal pairing of veteran baseball coach Darcy Simard and young coach Arjana Eilers, who completed her own collegiate playing career just two years ago.

“My job is easy because I have two incredible coaches,” Hartman said. “Darcy has a ton of experience coaching and he brings so much to the table. Arjana is the greatest coach to have too because she is so positive and cares so much about the game and giving back, but she also cares so much about these girls. She’s truly a special coach.

“She offers something that Darcy and I can’t bring with all of her experience as a softball pitcher. It’s a weakness of mine and to have someone I fully trust is a blessing for me.”

The league is currently on a month-long break, which allowed teams to enter tournaments like the Wheat City Classic the Magic organization hosted on the weekend. Westman, which won silver at their event, heads out in the next two weekends to Melfort, Sask., and Dickinson, N.D. Hartman isn’t worried about the break from league play, saying his team is still on the field.

“We just played Eastman twice and that’s the team we play in three weeks,” Hartman said. “We’re still playing softball games, we’re still learning, we’re still getting a lot of great experiences that’s going to push us to be better. We’re super excited to hit the road for the next two weeks.”

Since Eilers went to school and played at Dickinson State, the players will have a chance to tour their facilities and meet the staff.

Westman returns to MPSL action on June 28 to kick off the second half when they visit Eastman at Friedensfeld Community Centre.

The 24-game regular season ends on July 12, with the provincials being held in Friedensfeld — a hamlet south of Steinbach — from July 17 to 20. If the Magic are able to overcome the powerful Phillies and the other five MPSL teams at provincials, the western Canadian championships are Aug. 7-10 in Abbotsford, B.C.

“We’re just going to continue to try to tighten things up,” Hartman said of the long-term outlook. “We’re continuing to build defensively in our confidence and our understanding of (cutoffs) and what to do in certain situations.

“We’re going to try to keep teaching and building up their confidence and make sure we’re having a lot of fun while doing it at the same time.”

pbergson@brandonsun.com