Perfect Game Championship: Canes 7, Other Canes 5

In a tense championship game, Canes-Gallaher won the Perfect Game Super Qualifier title with a 7-5 win over Canes-Brannon. 

The title victory was marked by multiple incredible plays. Consider this: the Canes were actually outhit 11-7, but ended half of their six defensive innings in the following ways:

A triple play.

Throwing out a runner at the plate.

A double play.

For the weekend, by the way, the Canes defense had five double (or triple) plays.

And if you felt like you were a little more nervous than usual, it's probably because of the fact that the Canes scored all seven of their runs with two outs, batting .444 with runners in scoring position and two outs.

The win earned a slot in the prestigious Super25 tournament in Florida, which...we will worry about later. 

Championship Canes scoring plays

First inning

Jake reached on an error and stole second. Gavin's fielder's choice advanced him, and he scored on a throwing error. Chace drew a two-out walk, stole second, went to third on an error, and scored on Andrew's single.

Score after one-half inning: Canes 2, Other Canes 0

Second inning

Elias reached on an error and went to second on Asher's fielder's choice. He scored on Jake's two-out single.

Score after one and a half innings: Canes 3, Other Canes 0

Fourth inning
Brady and Elias had back-to-back singles. Asher walked. Gavin crushed a two-out, three-run double.
Score after three and a half innings: Canes 6, Other Canes 2

Fifth inning
Ashton picked up a two-out walk and stole second. JT scored him with a rope double.
Score after four and a half innings: Canes 7, Other Canes 4

Pitching Performances

Drew started and went three strong innings.

Chace finished it up with three great innings of relief.

Dugout wisdom
After changing fields yet again, the Canes found lots of props in the first-base dugout. Snipers are always looking for equipment, of course. Start with Ben, who found this pitching rubber and quickly turned it into, as he explained, "a turret gun."

Then it was discovered that the Dirtbags had left their dugout poster in a giant green tube on the ground. This, obviously, was a perfect bazooka, which took anywhere from two to four players to operate:

(Please note that Brian could not be distracted from his texting by all of this tomfoolery.)

Championship Web Gems

• With runners on first and second in the second, Drew bounced off the mound to retrieve a dribbler and fired to Ben to get the lead runner at third.
• Let me set the scene for you: the Other Canes had runners on first and second in the bottom of third with no outs and a one-run game. The number-three hitter was at the plate. On an 0-1 count, he sizzled a liner that was ticketed for the right field corner. But Chace stuck out a big paw and snagged it in the air. He stepped on first to get a huge momentum-changing double play...but then decided he might as well end the inning, so he threw to Gavin covering second for a triple play. Yes, a triple play.
• With two runs in and the tying run on base in the fourth, the batter dropped a sinking liner in front of Jake in right. The runner on second tried to score, but Jake popped up and threw a strike to Ashton at the plate, who chased down the runner for the tag and the third out of the inning.
• With a runner on first in the fifth and one out, Gavin gobbled up a grounder through the middle, stepped on second, and threw to Drew at first for the inning-ending double play.
• Jake got another outfield assist in the sixth, this time throwing from right field to Gavin at second to get the force on a runner who hesitated before going from first to second.

Championship line score	1	2	3	4	5	6	R	H
Canes-Gallaher	2	1	0	3	1	0	7	7
Canes-Brannon	0	2	0	2	1	X	5	11