Colts look to defend provincial baseball title

By JAMES TUBB on April 17, 2024.

jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb

The Monsignor McCoy Colts senior boys baseball team looks to have another strong spring season.

The Colts won the Alberta Premier Baseball League championship last year over the Medicine Hat High Hawks and return this spring looking to find the same path of success. It’s a season ahead that head coach Cole Schreiber says will be an exciting one for his group and he is looking to see who takes another step.

“We have a lot of returning guys and a lot of guys who are looking to take a new role on the team,” Schreiber said. “Not quite sure where we’re going to fit yet, a little bit of uncertainty with how guys are going to slot into certain roles and how all the chips are going to fall with everybody, but exciting for us to bring back a lot of returners and even add a couple of new ones from some other schools that wanted to come over here.

“That’s big for us and we’re looking to have another strong year.”

The Colts entered the finals last season as the underdog, facing an undefeated Hawks team. They jumped ahead 6-1 in the first five innings of the finals before rain postponed the contest for two days and they ultimately came out on top 11-7.

Their core of returning players will play a big role, Schreiber, says as they look to fill the roles of players who graduated after that championship.

“Losing our 12s last year, those guys were so important to us every night, so we’re hoping that our returning guys can take a bigger step,” Schreiber said. “They surprised us last year and I’d be happy again if they could surprise us a little more because it would mean that we’re going to be super competitive. But anytime you can bring back guys that have won a championship and have that experience of playing in the big game, that’ll help.”

The Colts kicked off the spring season with an exhibition game Monday night against the Hawks, falling 5-4. Schreiber says it’s a promising look for baseball in Medicine Hat seeing how close the two teams were and he is looking forward to their next matchups in the season.

“For us to play a good game, and they played a good game too, but to have it be a one-run ballgame and unfortunately come out on the losing end of it, but good for our guys to play in a tight ballgame before the year starts,” Schreiber said. “Good to see a couple of their arms and we got to go through a bunch of ours to get everybody on the mound a little bit. Overall for the city, it’s great when we get to come out and have two teams that look like we’re going to be fairly close again in the standings.”

Looking at his own team, Schreiber says they will have strong pitching that should lead the way through the spring and, he hopes, back to a title defence.

“We have three (pitchers) I would say are pretty solid for us and are going to give us a chance to win every night,” Schreiber said. “We have a younger guy coming in who’s a Grade 9 but he’s a good player, he’s here for a reason and we think he can help us win every night. We’re hoping that our returning guys can take a bigger step, so we’ll lean on our older guys again and hope our top three pitchers can win us a lot of ballgames.”

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