The St. Albert Tigers just can’t seem to win against Mother Nature. This year the senior men’s team moved their annual tournament from June to July to avoid the rain that has plagued the competition in recent years, but the tournament was rained out anyway.
“I don’t know if I want to say it’s cursed, but I think it’s been rained out five of the last six years,” said Tigers head coach Marc Dallorto.
Teams were able to play round robin games Friday night and during the day Saturday, but the Tigers’ 8 p.m. game was rained out by downpours and on Sunday morning the tournament was cancelled.
In the one contest the hometown Tigers played Friday night, they beat the St. Albert Tigers Padres team made up of Tigers alumni. Dallorto says the tournament was short a team and the 35 and over Padres wanted to get in some practice before the Oldtimers competition next month so they decided to compete in the Tigers tournament.
The final score on Friday was 5-1 for the young Tigers.
“They were rusty, but then they started playing pretty well,” Dallorto says of the Padres.
He says former Tiger Dave Ross did a good job on the mound for the Padres.
Jessy Beley hit a home run for the Tigers in the second inning and the head coach says Craig Tomas did very well pitching the first five innings before Matt Hammond took the mound to finish the game for the Tigers.
On Saturday, the Padres went on to win 3-1 over Parkland. In other round robin competition the Red Deer Riggers bested Fort Saskatchewan 6-3 in two extra innings and then beat the Confederation Cubs 8-7. Fort Saskatchewan won their second game 7-4 over the Cubs.
Dallorto said the diamonds at Legion Memorial Park were too soaked for play on Sunday morning.
“Maybe we should call this tournament The Rainmaker instead of the rodeo.”
