Mustangs bring home gold

The Welland Mustangs faced adversity at the Ontario Baseball Association 12U B championships, but passed the test with flying colours.

The Mustangs rallied from a 10-run deficit with eight runs in the seventh inning to defeat Waterdown 18-15 in the championship final in Halton Hills.

“All season we told them if we wanted to win this we were going to have to win a game from behind, we wouldn’t always be playing with the lead,” Mustangs coach Jay Falardeau said. “They had to prepare themselves to not always play with the lead.”

Welland opened the tournament with a 5-4 win over Stratford before edging Woodslee 4-3 in extra innings. The Mustangs then topped Kawartha 11-5, edged Waterdown 11-8 with seven runs in the seventh and defeated Halton Hills 16-6 to advance to the final.

“We got tested a couple of times. In the game we won in extra innings, we tied it in the sixth and then won it,” Falardeau said. “It was definitely a roller-coaster throughout the tournament.

“The kids handled it (adversity) pretty well, especially in the final. We got behind by 10 runs early and just kept chipping away and chipping away, and our pitching depth came through and the length of our lineup was key part of our win.”

Falardeau said the Mustangs had high aspirations heading into the weekend.

“Absolutely we went in there thinking we had a chance to win,” he said. “We played some good tournaments and we played against major (peewee) teams in our league all season. It definitely helped our development in the long term.

“Our kids played really well and handled themselves well.”

Members of the team are: Zoe Falardeau, Travis Guttin, Chance Hubbel, Spencer Burke, Kelsan Stayzer, Callum Brown, Derek Dubé, Jack Ilskens, Mason VanDyke, Tytan Worrall, Tyler Ray and Jacob Doucette.

Falardeau was assisted by Stefan Ilskens, Tim Burke and Travis Hubbel.