“One of our pitchers is probably one of the top pitchers in Canada. Our goal was to keep him fresh for most of the week. We were able to, with our others pitchers, got a lot of work for us, and did a lot of good things for us, so we were able to keep him fresh. Sunday he had one game to pitch and that was huge.”
That pitcher was Nathan Wylie, who was not only named round robin all-star pitcher, but playoff MVP as well.
Kerr says the entire team believed in themselves, especially in front of the home team.
“We were definitely confident, we knew we had the team that could be here on Sunday. We’ve been in enough of these tournaments in the past that not everything goes as planned and it could be a grind. Things keep going smoothly for them and things went as planned. We kept climbing all week and we plateaued Sunday at the right time. “
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The Napanee Express win Sunday afternoon and celebrate on the field (Photo: Lisa Alberta/Napanee Express)
Wylie spoke to Quinte News after the win saying:
“Thought we played great all week. Nationals is always a grind, we grind it out every game we had. Just the playoff round Saturday was huge just to get those two wins and have a big rest for Sunday and come out here and play one game and win it.”
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The Napanee Express celebrate their national title (Photo: Lisa Alberta/Napanee Express)
Wylie added that playing on the home diamond in front of the home crowd was also a big benefit.
Surreal experience. Having all the guys you played with the year before aging up, coming to cheer you on. Knowing that we lost last year 2-1, they were all rooting for us. We wanted to win it for them too. Just everyone being around cheering was a big help for us and got us fired up.”
After losing just once in the round robin, the Express won twice Saturday and booked themselves a bye to the finals.
The Wilmot Ontario Thunder took silver and the Brookfield Nova Scotia Elks grabbed bronze.
Short stop Chris Alberta received his gold medal Sunday afternoon
