Garden Valley Zodiacs - PCI Saints Classic Fastpitch Tournament Champions
Back Row (L-R): Darcie Reimer (coach), Aleah Hildebrand, Madi Toews, Hailey Buhler, Kara Loewen, Katie Heppner, Jenn Smith, Caitlin Parr (coach), Staci Siemens (coach)
Front Row (L-R): Indigo Wiebe, Abby Matuszewksi, Madi Penner, Cali Penner, Sherry Peters, Gina Giesbrecht, Quinn Hamilton

 

The Garden Valley Zodiacs reeled off five straight wins this past weekend and won the PCI Saints Classic Fastpitch Tournament in Portage la Prairie.

"We were pretty excited because it's the beginning of the season so we saw it more as a building tournament,” said Zodiacs coach Darcie Reimer. “After we won our first one, the second and the third, we realized we did have a shot of winning it. It was really neat to see the girls come together. We haven't won a tournament in the last few years so it's really nice to see how their hard work the past couple of years paid off."

GVC was perfect in the round robin.

The Zodiacs defeated the Nellie McClung Stingers of Manitou 9-4 in their opener and then beat the Major Pratt Trojans of Russell 3-1 and the Steinbach Regional Secondary School Sabres 5-1.

"Our team had a .345 batting average and .492 on base percentage so those numbers got us a lot of runs,” Reimer said. “Our pitchers had 38 strikeouts and that really helped us win those games. It was exciting to see every single player contribute."

Jenn Smith, Hailey Buhler and Aleah Hildebrand shared the pitching load on the the weekend.

"All three gave our team a chance to win,” said Reimer. “They threw strikes and our defense made plays. It was really exciting to see everybody come together."

Smith got the win in both playoff games Saturday.

The Zodiacs downed the Neepawa Tigers 13-5 in the semifinals and beat the Boissevain Broncos 7-1 in the championship game.

Reimer was impressed with her team's victory over the Broncos.

"They are a good team and we knew that we had to play our best. It was tight for the first couple of innings, and then just like our girls did all weekend, they started swinging the bats and hitting the ball. Once we got started it seemed like Boissevain just couldn't catch us."

"Our confidence is pretty high right now after coming off this but we do know that we have a tough zone,” added Reimer. “Our goal right now is just to make it to the Zone 4 playoffs and hopefully do well there. We're not looking ahead to anything. We're taking this in stride and we know that every team in the zone is strong. We'll have to play our best to continue to have success this season."

The Zodiacs Invitational Fastpitch Tournament takes place this Friday & Saturday in Winkler.