Twins fall short of playoff berth

The Twins run for a playoff spot ended

Sunday when they were eliminated from playoff contention after a

tough 10-6 loss to Missoula at Memorial Field in a AA Legion

Baseball game.

Zach Maassen crushed a grand slam to

center in the fourth and Kyler Blades added a solo shot in the

fifth, but it wasn’t enough to keep pace with the league champion

Mavericks. Missoula rallied with five runs in the fifth to take the

lead for good.

Glacier had chances down the stretch

but ended up stranding runners in the sixth, seventh and ninth

innings.

Kyler Blades finished 3-for-4 while

Devyn Rocker, Jeremy Neilsen, Geoff Streeter, Chris King, Carl

Talsma and Maassen had one hit each.

Going into the game, Glacier needed the

win along with a Kalispell loss to make the playoffs. Kalispell

ended up knocking of Lethbridge 5-4 on Sunday.

“It was a good day of baseball in the

western conference. It’s been a long time since the Glacier Twins

have played meaningful baseball this late in the season. We were

definitely proud of the position we put ourselves in, but we

couldn’t get the win today,” said Glacier coach Lindsay

Fansler.

The Twins swept a series with Medicine

Hat earlier in the week to keep their chances alive.

“The kids stuck with it and played hard

to last game.” Fansler said.

The Twins might have missed the

playoffs, but the club showed great improvement over past seasons.

They nearly doubled their win total and beat every team in the

conference at least once, including a sweep of top-ranked

Missoula.

Memorial Park was often packed, too,

likely due to a combination of fan-friendly events and the Twins

potent offense.

“It’s always good for the kids to see

that type of atmosphere at the park,” Fansler said. “If the Twins

are going to be successful going forward, we need to keep that up.

People come out to watch when we play good baseball.

“We had a lot of fun with the kids on

offense this season. They bought into our philosophy of being

patient at the plate. That contributed to our success.”

He noted that the defense was steady

all year and the pitching came into better shape toward the end of

the season.

He’s also proud of how the kids

represented themselves and the Twins organization on and off the

field.

“We had great contribution all around,”

he said. “A lot of those kids have been through a lot of coaching

changes and losing seasons.”

As for next year, Glacier loses 10 of

the current 13 team members.

“But I’ve got some good athletes coming

up,” Fansler said. “We’re looking to have a strong club again next

year.”

The coach said he’ll return next

season.

The Twins have the added incentive of

playing host to the state tournament next year.

Although the host team gets an

automatic slot, the Twins have higher goals in mind.

“We’re going to make sure our goal is

to qualify for that,” Fansler said.