An exciting week of baseball is coming up for Strathmore: we're hosting the 2022 Alberta Zone Championship! Strathmore and Cheadle will be sharing hosting duties.
It's exciting enough that we'll be able to see some of the best young baseball players in the province on our diamond, but there's even more reason to go than just that: the Strathmore Reds very own Aubrey Stender has been chosen as one of the players in Zone 2! He'll be in action in Strathmore this Saturday at 12 p.m., and he said he's excited to represent his hometown on his home field.
"It's pretty awesome. It's an honour to get to play on the team and get to try out for the Baseball Alberta team. And I'm only picked out of a handful of kids, which is really good," Stender said.
Eight zones will be competing in this tournament, and the zones cover a huge portion of Alberta, so there was no shortage of competition for Stender to be chosen. Zone 2 stretches from High River to Olds and has 101 communities sending their best baseball players. Stender explained he had to try out with many other players to earn his spot on the team.
"There's a bunch of people that came around from our zone and then they tried out in one diamond, so there was like a million kids at one diamond. We took a few ground balls, hit a few balls, caught some pop flies, and then we just go from there."
Stender is known for his big hitting prowess, as he hit 10 homeruns with the Reds this season, including one at the provincial tournament. He hopes to show off his batting skills this upcoming weekend.
Stender after hitting his second grand slam of the season in CheadleGiven that the team is made up of players all across Southern Alberta, Stender said it's been a bit of an adjustment period to get comfortable with all the new teammates and playing styles.
"During practices we've been pretty good, we've been creating a lot of chemistry. It's not as bad as it was at the beginning when no one knew each other, but now that everyone's getting more comfortable and it's getting close to game time it's getting better."
This tournament could go a long way in deciding who will be asked to play for Team Alberta, so we may be seeing Stender hitting homeruns all across the country if this tournament goes well!
Make time in your calendar to cheer Stender on this upcoming Saturday at noon, when Zone 2 will be playing Zone 7 in Strathmore!
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Fri, May 3, 10:00 AM
