The Moose Jaw Little League All-Stars have landed in Ancaster, Ont..
Now let the fun begin.
The All-Stars went through some of their first official orders of business on Wednesday at the Little League Canadian Championship, including the entire circus that is media day at the event.
The team also had a chance to settle into their accommodations at Redeemer University, with each of the seven squads taking part in the week-plus-long tournament living in on-campus resident townhouses for players and coaches only.
“We’re all being put up in an ‘athletes village’ kind of thing, we have two townhouses and each townhouse holds eight people, so that will be pretty neat,” said assistant coach Darryl Pisio during the team's send-off on Monday night.
“This is the first year this has happened, and I think this is just prepping. When you do get to the Little League World Series, the facilities are exactly the same way. It’s all secured and just for the kids and coaches, and it’s all for the experience of mingling with other players and other teams and having a fun atmosphere.”
Members of this year's Prairie champions attended the 2018 World Series in Williamsport, Penn. and were impressed with what they heard and saw from players and teams there. Having a chance to see that kind of thing on a smaller scale in Ancaster is something the squad is looking forward to.
“There’s kids that always talk about things like playing ping pong against the Japanese team, so here they'll get to meet kids from the Atlantic, kids from B.C. who they might never have met otherwise,” Pisio said. “It’s going to be another cool part of the experience the kids get to be a part of, and it also preps whoever wins Canadians and shows them what it’s going to be like at Worlds.”
Now there's the whole thing of getting to that next step.
The All-Stars officially kick off their quest Thursday at 8 a.m. Moose Jaw time, 10 a.m. in Ontario, when they take on Quebec's Diamond Academy Mirabel. The game will be broadcast on CBC.ca.
“The first game will be a tough match, the Quebec team is an Academy team and they’ve been in the semifinals and finals the last couple of years, so they’ll be strong and we expect that,” Pisio said. “But all the teams there are good, just like us. There will be six other strong teams there and we know they’re going to be tough games.”
Moose Jaw will take on host Ancaster on Friday at 3 p.m. before closing out the week against Atlantic on Saturday at 12 p.m. and settling into their rest day on Sunday.
Based on what they've seen and heard so far, the All-Stars are expecting to be competitive right from the first pitch tomorrow morning.
“We watched the B.C. championship online (Coquitlam defeated Little Mountain) and both teams are good, but it wasn’t something where we thought ‘wow, this is unreal’,” Pisio said. “Then Glace Bay, the Atlantic champion, has six kids returning from reaching the final last year... The competition will be strong but if we play Moose Jaw baseball and go from there we know we're going to give ourselves a chance.”
The remainder of the tournament is as follows:
Aug. 5 – Alberta, 9 a.m.
Aug. 6 – British Columbia, 7 a.m.
Aug. 7 – Ontario, 10 a.m.
Aug. 8 – Rain date, tiebreakers
Aug. 9 – Semifinals, 8 a.m. and 11 a.m.
Aug. 10 – Championship final, 8 a.m.
