Robbie Dombrowski, head coach of the WCBL Yorkton Cardinals, wants to thank the fans. It has been a difficult season, with few wins, but the fans stuck with the team.
“I’ve got to give a big shout out to the City of Yorkton. We’ve had a really tough year, we don’t have many wins at all, and they came out here on our last night, and they showed up in numbers, and our guys absolutely fed off of their energy.”
The July 31 game against the Weyburn Beavers was the team’s last home game, and they gave fans something to remember, with a big win for the home team.
Yorkton wasn’t the first on the board, with Weyburn getting their first run from Jack Barrie in the top of the first.
The Cardinals immediately responded. Zachary Taylor kicked off the scoring for the cardinals with a double RBI, hitting home Tanner Huber and Luke Shekeryk. Taylor himself came home off of the bat of Kai Takahashi-Ho.
The second inning saw one more run from the Cardinals, with Tanner Huber getting an unearned run thanks to an error from the Beavers’ right fielder.
In the seventh, the Cardinals cemented their lead. Grant Kosanke scored off the bat of Matthew Korman. This was followed by a double from Logan MacDougall, which also brought in two runs, from Luke Shekeryk and Korman.
“We got a huge suicide squeeze bunt down, they didn’t really know how to field it, that turned into a base hit and that really got us going in the seventh inning. Those were three huge runs that we got, because as you can see no lead is ever safe, it always gets a little hairy at the end, and those were really important runs for us.”
The final score was 7-1 for Yorkton. Pitcher Shawn Munro had the win for the Cardinals while Christian Vick was tagged with the loss for Weyburn.
While the season is wrapping up, Dombrowski is proud of the team, and proud that they’re still fighting up to the end.
“Really, it’s a little bit bittersweet, because the season is coming to the end, and everybody is a little bit sad that this is the last time that this group is going to be together... They’ve really became close, they’ve really became friends with one another, which is really what this is all about. They only have six games left with each other, and they want to make the most of it, and they want to play good baseball. That’s not something that comes from me, that comes from the leadership on the team, I commend those guys. No matter what happened this year, we’ve had good leadership.”
The team is already looking towards next year, and Dombrowski said that they’re going to get stronger, and reward fans for sticking through a tough season.
“To see a city support a team that’s not great, I can only imagine what it’s going to be next year when we have a really good team.”
But the season is not yet over, the Cardinals will have a road trip in Alberta. With two three-game series’ on the trip, Dombrowski said their goal is to win at least one, though they want to get both.
“Edmonton, from what I hear, is a really fun city, so it should be a rewarding trip for the guys who stuck it out in a tough season.”
