The Prince Albert Astros are ready to host provincials at the Max Power Ball Parks this weekend.
The U20s will take place at Kinsmen Field while the U17s will be at Rotary Field. There a total of eight teams across the two divisions. The U17s consist of the Astros, Saskatoon Jr Jacks, Laird Valley Bluejays, Rosebud Royals and Okanese Thunderstrikers. The U20s will have the Astros, Saskatoon Jr Jacks and Valley Vikings.
Neil Finch is the head coach of the U17 Astros. He says it’s always special when Prince Albert gets a chance to play host to the province.
“It’s always exciting to host and put together what you’ve been trying to do all season. They’re excited to have people come here. We’re hosting both the U17 and U20 boys provincials so there’ll be lots of excitement around the ball diamond this weekends”
The U20 Astros will take on Saskatoon on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. followed by the Valley Vikings at 6 p.m. Their gametime on Sunday will be determined by how they do in their Saturday games.
The U17 team will play two games on Friday (10 a.m. vs Saskatoon, 2 p.m. vs Okanese) and two games on Saturday (10 a.m. vs Laird Valley, 4 p.m. vs Rosebud).
Heading into the tournament, Finch says he feels confident that his team will get a chance to move onto nationals in Surrey, British Columbia next month.
“If our boys play well, we have a very good chance of moving on, but the reason you play the games is you never know what’s going to happen. We’re going to have to do all the little things right.
“I think our bats have been pretty strong from the start and defensively, we have been improving and getting better and better as the season has went on. I’m looking forward to putting it all together this weekend. We’ve had 33 games after (Wednesday) that we’ve played in and so heading into the weekend, we definitely have tuned up enough to be ready.”
The top three teams from round robin will advance to the championship round on Sunday. When asked what his team will need to do well to have success, Finch says he wants to see his team manage things well between their ears.
“I think one of the things is not on the physical side, but on the emotional side, so just making sure that we stay mostly level, but intense at the same time, which is hard for athletes to do. If we can find a way to do that better than other teams, we’ll be absolutely fine.”
