Elliott: Erindale juniors erase runners, but held hitless in Gold Bat senior tourney by Newmarket

The Newmarket Hawks, shown here after their 2024 CABC Gold Bat tournament win, were poised to play in the 2026 championship game before rain wiped it out.

June 24, 2026

By Bob Elliott

Canadian Baseball Network

You can see some strange things at the ballpark.

Plays you have never seen before.

Doesn’t matter whether it is the Rogers Centre or your closest sandlot diamond.

Like the first inning of the Newmarket Hawks-Erindale Cardinals juniors match at the CABC Gold Bat senior tournament at Stan Slack Field at Errol Russell Park in the Sarnia area.

Erindale starter Daniel Lucas allowed one run in the first, but it could have been worse had his teammates not recorded all three outs on the base paths.

Lead-off hitter CF Bryn Sanford ripped a ball to right and made a hard turn at first base thinking about second. RF Marcus Herback got the ball in quickly to 2B Ryan Aversa, who quickly threw to 1B Alex Pieper for the 9-4-3 out. One out.

Next was C Troy McLoughlin and he was hit by a Lucas pitch. A few pitches into the next at bat he was thrown out at second base trying to steal … C Elijah Morales to SS Jackson Irving. Two outs on the bases.

2B Cooper Tompkinson then laced a single to the outfield and advanced to second on an error a few pitches later. 1B Robin Fox-Pappas doubled in the gap to score and rounded second base. Irving took the throw, faked a throw and back doored the runner at 2B Aversa to end the inning. Three out on the bases.

Certainly one of the more interesting innings of base running you could see.

Newmarket survived its overzealous base running, winning 12-0 over the juniors ... and not giving up a hit in the process. Combining on the no-no were Lukas Touma, who started and worked two innings. Reid Lunney pitched one inning for the win and Brendan Clarke - four innings for the save.

The championship game— between the Sarnia Brigade and Newmarket — was postponed due to rain and wet field condiitons and no champion was declared for this year's event.