Coquitlam-Moody Reds zoomed into Sunday's final at the B.C. Peewee AAA provincial baseball championships.
Then the fuel tank hit empty.
The host Reds were stomped 9-2 by Abbotsford and settled for the silver medal at Coquitlam Town Centre Park.
"We had a couple injuries so we only had 10 kids the whole weekend," said Reds head coach Randy Downes. "We got a lot out of the kids we had but we just ran out of gas."
Even had they won, the Reds were ineligible to compete in the Western Canadian championships starting tomorrow (Thursday) in Nanaimo because they competed last month in the Continental Amateur Baseball Association (CABA) World Series in Sylvania, Ohio.
"We wanted to win the provincials because we weren't going to the Westerns," Downes said. "It just wasn't meant to be."
The Reds were 5-0 going into the final, including a 5-2 clubbing of Cloverdale in the semifinals.
The Reds opened the tournament with a 5-0 romp over Ridge Meadows, then needed nine innings to shake off Ladner 2-1. They then posted another narrow round-robin win -- 4-3 over Nanaimo -- before bombing Richmond 11-1 to win their pool and move on to the semis versus Cloverdale.
"I thought we'd at least get to the semifinals because we were the favourites in the round robin," Downes said. "It was nice to beat Cloverdale but Abbotsford was a little tougher."
Despite being under-manned, the Reds only trailed 1-0 through four innings before their arms -- and legs -- began to weaken, leading to the eventual lopsided count.
"It's been a long seven weeks for our guys, with a big trip in between," Downes said. "I'm proud of the way they performed."
The Reds are hosting their annual Labour Day tournament, which is expected to feature eight teams, Sept. 1-5 at Town Centre Park.
Players born in 1999 or 2000 (12 and 13) who are interested in joining the Reds can email [email protected].
