By Darryl G. Smart, Brantford Expositor
There’s a new Chief on the fastball circuit and they have aspirations of dominating the world.
And after this weekend’s 9-8 win in the final over New Zealand’s national team at the Legends of Fastball tournament in Kitchener, the Six Nations Hill United Chiefs have fired the warning shot.
“We had quite the weekend,” said Bryan Porter, who is one of the players and one of the people behind the scenes with the team. “It was a pretty charged final. We beat them twice this weekend and they aren’t used to losing, let alone to a club team.”
With two tournament victories under the Chiefs’ belt, the Legends of Fastball tournament was going to be the first big test for the team ranked second in the world by the International Softball Congress.
In the final, the Chiefs scored five runs in the first inning and addied two more in the second.
The New Zealand Black Sox chipped away and took the lead thanks to a three-run inning in the top of the sixth. But like they’ve done throughout the season, the Chiefs rallied back and scored two runs in the bottom half of the sixth inning to seal the win.
Adam Folkard earned the win on the mound, while Brad Ezekiel had a lead-off homerun. Mark Arsenault belted a three-run homerun to help the cause.
“We let them back into it but the guys fought hard,” Porter said. “One of the things about this team is we don’t give up. We know we have a lot of fire power, so if we’re down we know we can come back.”
With the win, the Chiefs earned the Eastern Canadian berth for this year’s ISC World Fastball Tournament, in Midland, Mich, August 11 to 18.
“It’s nice to earn that spot at worlds,” Porter said. “Because we were the only Canadian team to get to the final, we got it before it started. But we really wanted to earn it by winning the tournament.”
To get to the final, the Chiefs struck three times in the first inning, while Folkard gave up one run on six hits in a 3-1 win over Argentina’s national team in the semifinal.
In round robin action, the Chiefs beat the Kitchener Cubs 8-1, Midland Explorers 8-2, Black Sox 8-7, and the Toronto Gators 11-5.
“We knew this would be a huge test for us,” Porter said. “To win it, we needed to beat two national teams so that says something. It was nice to prove what we’re all about and show everyone that we can play ball.
“We knew when this team was put together we had a good team, but to finally show everyone is great to see,” he said. “We really have a family atmosphere and that’s one of the reasons why we have the players we do. They saw that we’re one big family and they liked that. We’ve gone about things the right way and to see the success we’re having is great.”
eric legge says
The Hill team looked in mid-season form, I think, playing in 2 previous tournaments helped. Played the Black Sox
4 times and won every game, twice before the Legends and twice in the event. Deserve to be ranked no 1.