Two games into their first-ever playoff series, Slave Lake’s Ladies’ fastball team is in the drivers’ seat. It hasn’t been easy at all, but the Storm were up two games to none in the best-of-five series at the start of the week.
On Monday, July 28 the Storm beat the Gift Lake Bunnies 25 – 24 in Slave Lake. The following Wednesday they won 15 – 12 in Gift Lake.
The first game was a battle from start to finish, with both teams hitting and scoring a ton, but also making plenty of errors in the field. The Bunnies stormed out with six runs in the first inning, but in the next few innings the Storm struck back and after about five innings the score was tied somewhere in the teens. That’s when things got really interesting.
“They (Gift Lake) scored nine in the sixth,” says Coach Brian Bouchard. “They were up nine runs.”
In the bottom of the sixth the Storm scored five and held the Bunnies scoreless in the top of the seventh. In the bottom of the final inning, the Storm scored four more to tie it. In the extra inning, Gift Lake led off and scored three. Slave Lake followed with four for the victory.
“It was a good game,” says Bouchard. “Pretty intense ball. There were two plays at home where the catcher got run over. The girls played hard.”
On one of those plays, Carmen Pearson colllided with the Gift Lake catcher, dislodging the ball and keeping a critical rally alive.
Paulette Ward started the game on the mound for the Storm and Ashley Kerr finished it off. Pearson, Shereen Bouchard and Trina Torgerson all had huge games at plate, reaching base at least five times apiece. Pearson’s sacrifice fly drove in the game-winning run.
Wednesday’s game saw better defence and a lower score. Ashley Kerr pitched the whole game for Slave Lake and the Storm led the whole way.
“Our bats were pretty much on fire again,” says Bouchard.
Game three of the series was Monday this week in Slave Lake and Game 4, if necessary, will be back in Gift Lake, probably on Wednesday. The winner of the series advances to the league final against the winner of the Faust – Gift Lake Lakers’ series. All the Slave Lake games are played at the northeast diamond of the Sinclair fields.

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