Skip to content

Quesnel girls help Thunderbirds win

T-Birds clinch gold medal in silver bracket of Kelowna tourney
12684424_web1_180713-QCO-softballgirls
Quesnel softball players, from left to right: Destiny Bautista, Kaitlyn Doucette, Rylee Paterson and Kiana Mero. Contributed photo

Four Quesnel girls helped the Prince George Thunderbirds win gold in the silver bracket of the U16B Provincial Championships in Kelowna on July 6-8.

Destiny Bautista, Kaitlyn Doucette, Rylee Paterson and Kiana Mero have been driving up to Prince George for games and practices three to four times a week and have played in five tournaments with them all around the province this season.

Don Doucette is also one of the assistant coaches.

READ MORE: Softball girls ready for B.C. Summer Games

The tournament for the Thunderbirds did not get off to the best start.

Powerful thunderstorms forced the cancellation of some of the games sending the girls off of their rhythm in the round robin portion.

They went 1-2 in a three-game round robin, which put them on the silver side of the playoffs.

In the knockout rounds the team scraped by Langford in a tight 4-3 first game.

They went up by seven runs against Ridge Meadows in game two of the playoffs but had to hang on for a 9-7 victory.

In the gold medal game, they faced off against the Abbotsford Outlaws with Kaitlyn Doucette getting the call to the mound.

By all accounts it was a tense game.

The Thunderbirds went up 1-0 but the Outlaws responded with two runs of their own to take the lead.

The game remained tight into the seventh inning, when the T-Birds put up two runs to regain the advantage at 3-2.

The Outlaws had the last at bat but were unable to mount a comeback and the T-Birds won the gold medal in the silver bracket.