The Saskatoon Berries closed out their inaugural Western Canadian Baseball League regular season in thrilling fashion on Monday afternoon at Cairns Field, walking off the visiting Moose Jaw Miller Express by a 4-3 final score.
The Berries are hoping to bring that same energy to their very first playoff series this week, matched up in the WCBL East Division semi-final against the Medicine Hat Mavericks.
“It usually takes some time to build up,” said Berries outfielder Jalen Freeman. “But for a team just to come out and make the playoffs for the first time is great. We’re excited to really go possibly win it the first year.”
After a slow start to their first season as a franchise, the Berries picked up the pace over July and early August to finish third in the division with a 31-25 record.
Now a quick, best-of-three series awaits Saskatoon against a second-seeded Medicine Hat team which has won six of eight meetings this summer.
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“Medicine Hat is a good opponent,” said Berries head coach Joe Carnahan. “They’ve played us very well this year. Their big thing is they battle at the plate, they have a lot of tough outs in their lineup and they can pitch it as well.”
Playing their first game in franchise history just over two months ago, the Berries have found the consistency they’ve craved early in their inaugural season and have aspirations of making a run through the WCBL playoffs over the coming weeks.
“To start the season, that’s obviously our goal,” said Carnahan. “We have more goals that we want to achieve as well here throughout the playoffs, that’s step one.”
Saskatoon ace Michael Singleton will get the call for Game 1 of the series Wednesday night in Medicine Hat, before Cairns Field hosts its first Berries playoff game at 7:00 pm Thursday.
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