Two eggs, three strips of bacon, and two pieces of toast with Nutella.
It’s not quite a superstitious pre-game ritual, but it’s what Mitch Townsend likes to eat before every baseball game.
At 15, Mitch is a towering six-foot-three-inches tall, and will age out of the Little League Juniors level this year. But first he has some work to do.
Mitch and his teammates from the Mount Seymour Little League All-Stars are headed to Lethbridge, Alta., to represent B.C. at the nationals Aug. 3-11 after topping another local lineup, a combined West Vancouver team, in the final game at the D5 Provincial Championship tournament held at Inter River Park last weekend.
“I thought we had a pretty good chance of winning because we played them the day before and we beat them pretty good, but I was still really nervous going into the game because it was the provincial final,” notes Mitch.
Although Mount Seymour led for much of the game, West Van narrowed the gap to two runs by the sixth inning, and Mitch says he didn’t know at that point who was going to win. By the top of the seventh, though, Mount Seymour had regained a wider lead. Back on defence in the bottom of the inning, Mitch was manning first base when, with two outs, a third West Van batter earned a walk to first but was thrown out by the catcher to end the game when he tried to steal second. The final score was 15-9.
“It was pretty fun. You know, it’s exciting,” says Mitch of the experience.
Earlier in the week, Mount Seymour won their first game of the tournament 15-0 against New West, but coach Daryl Townsend (also Mitch’s dad) said the crew was a little overconfident going into their second game and lost 14-4 against the same West Van team they would end up playing in the finals. The loss bumped them out of the winner’s bracket and meant they would have to win three games in a row to get back to the top in the double-knockout tournament.
“Our guys were ready to go and they wanted the championship. They wanted it, so they went out and worked for it. They got it,” says Townsend.
Good pitching and good hitting helped clinch the win, but Townsend notes that the entire team stepped up. “They went in and did their job like I know they can do,” he says.
Hosted by North Shore’s Little League Division 5, the tournament included six teams: Mount Seymour, Lynn Valley, Forest Hills, New West, D3 (Whalley/Langley/Coquitlam combined) and West Vancouver (West Vancouver/Highlands/North Vancouver Central combined).
According to coach Jason Pistawka, the West Van team was a last-minute throw-together group that exceeded expectations. (In Little League, if a team doesn’t have enough players for a tournament they can join with players from other teams.)
“Going to Lethbridge was not on our radar and we came within one win of advancing,” he says of the team’s performance at the tournament.
Although they were “West Van” on paper, Pistawka says the team wore “West-High-Central” on their hats, and were known by players and parents as the SwampDragons, which summed them up better. During the tournament week, the group put more emphasis on team-building exercises like attending a BC Lions game, enjoying pizza at the park, and even catching Pokemon together.
“If we had to do it all over again, we would all sign up again in a heartbeat, even if the same outcome was predetermined before signing up,” says Pistawka.
That type of positive attitude is something tournament director Peter Kvarnstrom (who is also publisher of the North Shore News) is happy to see.
“One of the things that we hope to instil in the players through this type of tournament play is discipline and respect for the game and for each other, and I think that we saw an exemplary example of that over the last week and a bit,” he says.
He calls the final game between the two North Shore teams a barn burner, noting it was a battle right to the end and could have gone either way.
“For most of (the players) the amount of excitement is just unbelievable. They are so excited to be playing at this competitive level. And the potential to reach a Canadian championship tournament in many other sports is just a dream, whereas it can be a reality in baseball and particularly here in D5,” he adds.
Kvarnstrom, who played baseball as a kid and coached his own kids through various levels of the game, says when he first got involved in more competitive play the North Shore was never dominant; they were always there, always keen, but never winners. That’s changing.
“I think we’re seeing a bit of a resurgence in baseball here on the North Shore,” he says.
This is the first time in at least 25 years that a Mount Seymour team has gone to the nationals, and they are heading there on the heels of another notable North Shore win: the D5 Bigs (ages 16-18) are at the nationals in Quebec this week after dominating the D3 squad at their provincial tournament earlier this month.
“This year with our Bigs and our Juniors team in Canadians it’s the first time that anybody can recall two teams from the North Shore being at the nationals in the same year,” notes Kvarnstrom, adding “I would say we have better than a fighting chance to see one of those two teams advancing to the World Series this year.”
Coach Townsend agrees that his team is going to the nationals with a big goal in mind.
“I think we’re going to be right in there and if everybody comes to play we’ve got a very, very good chance,” he says. “I’m very, very optimistic. We’re a very, very strong team. Having said that, you never know what your competition is going to be.”
He’s expecting tough matchups from Ontario and the Maritimes, among others, and says at this point, now knee-deep in paperwork as he organizes the logistics of getting 14 players to Alberta, he is both proud and “scared to death.”
“It’s a big deal. It is. And it’s an incredible amount of work,” says Townsend.
Although all of the players on this team have known each other from the league since they were about eight years old, they are spread out among three different Mount Seymour Junior level teams during regular season play. Once the regular season ends, there’s a call-out for all-stars to compete at the provincial tournament, which brought this current group together. So part of the strategy for Townsend is getting the players to work together as a team.
“It doesn’t matter how many good players you have. If they’re not all on the same page, it’s not happening,” he explains. “They’re all great baseball players, it’s just a matter of getting them to play as a team.”
Although they got this week off, the team will be back at practice next week preparing for the nationals and working primarily on pitching and hitting.
“You can teach any kid to play defensive baseball. It’s batting and pitching, that’s what it comes down to,” says Townsend.
At this level, games can turn on errors so staying focused is also key.
“Like I tell all the kids, everybody makes errors and so do I,” admits Townsend. “Baseball’s a game of errors and it’s what you do after the errors that counts.”
His son Mitch agrees: “A really good team will fight through the errors. Our skills are developed now so I think it’s more in our heads.”
Baseball is a team sport and “everybody has to do their job to win the game,” he adds.
Winning the nationals means heading to the Little League World Series but coach Townsend says they can’t think that far ahead.
“There’s way too much work to be done,” he notes. “Every team is really, really good and it all depends on who’s better on that day.”
Visit nsnews.com/sports/photo-galleries for more photo galleries of Little League and Twins play.
