Going by the results of their first four games this week in St. Croix, N.S., there is little doubt the Galway Hitmen are fiercely determined to regain the title of Canadian senior men’s fastpitch champion.
Through two days of the competition, the Newfoundland and Labrador representatives are 4-0 and have outscored the opposition 24-1 in the process.
Newfoundland teams (first with the sponsorship of 3Cheers Pub/Bud Light, then as Galway) won five straight national titles between 2012 and 2016, but last year in Saskatoon, Sask., the Hitmen were left to settle for silver, losing 6-5 to the East Hants Mastodons of Nova Scotia in the championship final.
On Thursday, the Hitmen downed Alberta’s Grande Prairie Pirates 5-1 and followed up with a 9-0 thrashing of the Wiarton, Ont., Nationals in a game shortened to five innings by the mercy rule.
On Wednesday, the Newfoundlanders opened with a pair of shutout wins, downing the Summerside, P.E.I. Eagles 3-0 before whitewashing the Saskatoon Angels 7-0.
The Hitmen have used three pitchers — Sean Cleary, Jason Hill and Colin Walsh — with all posting a shutout. Cleary has two wins, striking out 27 batters (an average of more than two per inning) in the process.
Hill has also been a big contributor with the bat, driving in seven runs.
He’s part of a fired-up offence that has so far produced a .600 hitter (Walsh), a .500 hitter (Stephen Mullaley) and two more hitting over .400 (Ryan Boland and Mathieu Roy).
Roy, the Quebec native and national team stalwart who has been picked up by the Hitmen for a second year in a row, has scored six times.
It’s a 10-team tournament, but each entry plays only six games in the preliminary round; the Hitmen, for example, won’t face the defending champion Mastodons unless they meet in the playoffs.
The Hitmen close out their preliminary schedule with games today against the Bulyea, Sask., Rustlers and Sooke, B.C. Loggers.
