Twins fall short of playoff berth
The Twins run for a playoff spot ended
Sunday when they were eliminated from playoff contention after a
tough 10-6 loss to Missoula at Memorial Field in a AA Legion
Baseball game.
Zach Maassen crushed a grand slam to
center in the fourth and Kyler Blades added a solo shot in the
fifth, but it wasn’t enough to keep pace with the league champion
Mavericks. Missoula rallied with five runs in the fifth to take the
lead for good.
Glacier had chances down the stretch
but ended up stranding runners in the sixth, seventh and ninth
innings.
Kyler Blades finished 3-for-4 while
Devyn Rocker, Jeremy Neilsen, Geoff Streeter, Chris King, Carl
Talsma and Maassen had one hit each.
Going into the game, Glacier needed the
win along with a Kalispell loss to make the playoffs. Kalispell
ended up knocking of Lethbridge 5-4 on Sunday.
“It was a good day of baseball in the
western conference. It’s been a long time since the Glacier Twins
have played meaningful baseball this late in the season. We were
definitely proud of the position we put ourselves in, but we
couldn’t get the win today,” said Glacier coach Lindsay
Fansler.
The Twins swept a series with Medicine
Hat earlier in the week to keep their chances alive.
“The kids stuck with it and played hard
to last game.” Fansler said.
The Twins might have missed the
playoffs, but the club showed great improvement over past seasons.
They nearly doubled their win total and beat every team in the
conference at least once, including a sweep of top-ranked
Missoula.
Memorial Park was often packed, too,
likely due to a combination of fan-friendly events and the Twins
potent offense.
“It’s always good for the kids to see
that type of atmosphere at the park,” Fansler said. “If the Twins
are going to be successful going forward, we need to keep that up.
People come out to watch when we play good baseball.
“We had a lot of fun with the kids on
offense this season. They bought into our philosophy of being
patient at the plate. That contributed to our success.”
He noted that the defense was steady
all year and the pitching came into better shape toward the end of
the season.
He’s also proud of how the kids
represented themselves and the Twins organization on and off the
field.
“We had great contribution all around,”
he said. “A lot of those kids have been through a lot of coaching
changes and losing seasons.”
As for next year, Glacier loses 10 of
the current 13 team members.
“But I’ve got some good athletes coming
up,” Fansler said. “We’re looking to have a strong club again next
year.”
The coach said he’ll return next
season.
The Twins have the added incentive of
playing host to the state tournament next year.
Although the host team gets an
automatic slot, the Twins have higher goals in mind.
“We’re going to make sure our goal is
to qualify for that,” Fansler said.