Seventh inning not enough to propel Jets to title

Following a marathon day of fastball action an Alberta-based team came up just a run shy of defending its national title.

The Red Nation Jets, however, did win some hardware, settling for second place in the women’s division at this year’s Canadian Native Fastball Championships.

The Jets, based out of the Alexis Nakota Sioux First Nation, were edged 5-4 by the Regina-club AMI Pride in the championship final.

The four-day national tournament, which was staged in Winnipeg, concluded on Aug. 1. The women’s division, which included 18 entrants, had its championship final though on July 31.

The Jets came into this year’s tournament as defending national champions, having won the 2010 crown at the event held at Saskatchewan’s Whitecap Dakota First Nation.

A year ago the Jets downed AMI Pride in the final.

“You’re never happy with second place,” said Jets manager Tony Alexis. “We’re going back next year to win it.”

The 2012 national tournament will be held in British Columbia although the exact location has yet to be announced.

The Jets dug themselves into a hole early on in Winnipeg. The club lost its opening game against the Ontario-based Iroquois Blaze.

Since there was a double-knockout format at the tournament, the Jets could not afford to lose another game as that would eliminate the team from further play.
“We came in flat-footed,” Alexis said of the club’s first match. “It was a wakeup call.”

Following that setback, the Jets racked up a string of eight impressive victories, including an 8-3 triumph over AMI Pride in its ninth match of the tournament.

Since the two clubs had just one loss each at that point, that set up the winner-take-all final game.

The Jets trailed 5-0 heading into the bottom of the seventh inning, the final inning of the championship match. With the Jets trailing by five runs and two outs, victory appeared all but certain for the AMI Pride. But things got rather interesting after that.

For starters, the Jets hit a two-run homer cutting the lead to 5-2.

“It was exciting all of a sudden,” Alexis said. “It woke everybody up.”

Following some more hits, the Jets found themselves down 5-4 with the tying run on first base. But the match ended when a Jets player, attempting to steal, was thrown out at second base.

The Jets ended up playing a whopping six matches on the Sunday. But Alexis said fatigue was not an issue.

“It was a long day,” he said. “But the girls were still going strong. They could have gone a couple of more games.”

Besides Alberta, the Jets 12-player roster includes athletes from Ontario, Nova Scotia and British Columbia.
“It’s called Red Nation Jets because it represents all different people,” said Alexis.

The Jets were also the runner-ups at the Canadian tournament in 2007, ’08 and ’09.