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Diamond Dust

Bantam Cardinals Sporting a 12-5 record, the bantam AAA St. Albert Cardinals know they are headed for the tier I provincials in Okotoks.

Bantam Cardinals

Sporting a 12-5 record, the bantam AAA St. Albert Cardinals know they are headed for the tier I provincials in Okotoks.

So during their four games this weekend, they will simply be making their final preparations for the big tournament next weekend. St. Albert is in fourth place and the top five go to tier I provincials, while the bottom four in the AAA league play for tier II honours. The Cardinals could move up to third before the end of the regular season, but their final record doesn't matter because at provincials it's a round robin format with each team playing the other four teams once.

St. Albert opens its four-game set at Legion Memorial Park today against Sherwood Park Gold (14-7) at 10 a.m. and the Spruce Grove White Sox (4-12) at 4 p.m. Sunday's doubleheader times against the Calgary Cubs (2-11) are noon and 3 p.m.

St. Albert coach Dave Maguire said his team will go "all-out" against Sherwood Park, but will hold some stuff back against them to fine-tune against the other teams, who will be playing in tier II.

"Some of the guys that haven't pitched as much, I want to give them some innings because it's important to have as many pitchers ready as possible for provincials," he said. "And then, there are a few offensive tactics that I would like to try, but I'll try them against tier II teams, because I don't want to show them to the tier I teams, so they don't know [the plays] are in our arsenal until we have to actually play them in provincials."

The Cardinals may have to make up a game postponed from earlier in the season against the SEEBA, who are currently fighting with Okotoks Red for the fifth and final spot in the tier I provincials.

In their most recent action, a doubleheader Sunday against Okotoks Black (14-6-1) at Legion park, the Cardinals won the first game 8-2, but blew a late lead in the second thanks to a bunch of Okotoks hits that just got by an infielder and a couple of St. Albert errors and lost 16-12.

"Am I unhappy that we didn't win? Absolutely," Maguire said. "Do I think that it's a little bit of adversity that is good for us before provincials? Absolutely, because we have to learn how to deal with adversity."

Peewee Red Birds

The peewee AAA Cardinals (10-5) are pretty much in the same position for provincials as their bantam counterparts.

St. Albert is second overall in the seven-team division, trailing only SEEBA (13-0)

Coach Darren Mazur said his team fell into a bit of a lull when they travelled to Lloydminster (6-0) for a doubleheader and lost both games, but have turned things around since then.

"Definitely their focus on the field, as far as defence goes, we're playing much better and our pitching has really stepped it up a notch," Mazur said. "I guess you could say all aspects of the game, because the bats have been going crazy [too]."

Lloydminster played in the Alberta AAA league because of lack of competition in Saskatchewan, but competed in Saskatchewan for provincials where the Border City team took home gold last weekend.

On Wednesday, St. Albert beat Red Deer (5-12) by an 8-7 margin on the road, but it was a game in which they were never really concerned about losing.

'We had a lot of kids in different positions that they would never played or they don't play regularly," Mazur said. "The kids were still confident that they could come back and take the game and they did."

Today at noon the Cardinals take on SEEBA and at 3 p.m. they play the Sherwood Park Athletics (1-10).

Provincials start Friday in Spruce Grove. The top two teams in the tourney will represent Alberta at westerns, Aug. 18 to 22 in Brandon, Man.

Senior AAA Tigers

The last game for the St. Albert Tigers (5-6) before the playoffs in the Sunburst Baseball league had to be moved from Legion Memorial Ball Park to Fort Saskatchewan on Wednesday, and the hometown Athletics (11-5) came out on top 8-0.

Fort Saskatchewan had a big sixth inning, scoring four runs. Dan Chappel went 3-for-3 in the game with three singles and one run batted in.

Meanwhile, the Tigers only managed four hits.

Next up is the senior AAA provincial championship tournament, hosted by St. Albert, which begins Aug. 4.

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