The Pembina Valley Orioles moved into round two of the Manitoba Junior Baseball League playoffs Thursday night while the Altona Bisons season came to end.

The Orioles got a bases loaded walk-off single from Liam Giesbrecht in the bottom of the ninth inning and beat the St. James A’s 10-9 at Optimist Park.

The O’s, who won the series opener 5-3 thanks to Branden Hatley’s 11-strike out performance on Tuesday night in Winnipeg, were trailing the A’s 9-6 the following night in Morden when TJ Matuszewski drilled a three-run homer in the bottom of the seventh.

Pembina Valley and St. James got one more inning in before game two was suspended due to darkness.

The Orioles eliminated the A’s the next night.

“The boys were really pumped,” said Pembina Valley coach Phil Hildebrand. “We had them in the bottom of their order and it was three up – three down. They came in and just the excitement that they had on the bench, there was no way that they were going to shut us down in number nine. Most guys were saying it was the best two games they had ever played in their lives for excitement – just going back and forth. Guys are really loving it right now.”

Pembina Valley will face the St. Boniface Legionaries in the MJBL semifinals.

“We played them four times and every game was tough,” noted Hildebrand. “I know the second half of the year, they’re probably one of the hottest teams in the league and they’ve carried that right into the playoffs. We’re going to have to come ready to play. We’re going to have to be focused and if we play like we did against St. James it should be a great series again.”

Game one is Sunday night at Whittier Park.

The Bisons lost 9-8 to the Interlake Blue Jays in the third and deciding game of the their opening round series at Access Field.

“The guys are a little disappointed but for some of them they still have a lot of midget ball to play,” said Altona coach Curt Letkeman. “We knew that Interlake would be tough but we also knew that we would be really thin on pitching. That’s what basically did us in. We didn’t have pitching due to the 18U Provincials this weekend and that’s kind of the way it played out.”

The Bisons, who finished the regular season schedule in second place with a 13-10 record, rallied for a 5-4 victory over Interlake on Tuesday night in Altona but lost game two 6-3 the following night at Quarry Park in Stonewall.

“The guys never gave up,” Letkeman said. “We were down big early in game three and just kept coming back. Three times we loaded the bases and just couldn’t push that run across. Even in the bottom of seven, we scored three to make it close and had the bases loaded and didn’t get that key hit like we did the other day.”

The Blue Jays will face the defending champion Elmwood Giants in round two.