History has been repeated by the Okotoks Dawgs.
For the second time as a franchise the Dawgs have completed a three-peat of Western Canadian Baseball League championships, capturing their eighth league title in knocking off the Moose Jaw Miller Express 6-5 on Connor Crowson’s walk-off solo home run to take the best-of-three final Saturday night at Seaman Stadium.
“The whole playoffs have been like that, everyone wants to beat us,” said Crowson, the playoff MVP. “And I know that we’re not going to ever give up.
“I literally just walked up and thought, ‘God, this is your at-bat take it' and I gave all faith to him. I just love this team and I think we’re going to keep winning next year.”
Crowson took a 1-1 fastball and hit it over the centre field fence, not realizing he ended the game as he tripped around first base.
“Even when I tripped I thought, ‘Oh no I screwed this up and thought it was a double off the wall,'” added Crowson, a homegrown Dawg from Okotoks. “I looked at Joe (Sergent) and he said, ‘It’s over we won it.'
“I was one of these little kids getting autographs from the older guys on this team so this is all pretty special.”
Heroes get remembered, but legends never die!#dawgs #WCBL #Champions #3peat #walkoff pic.twitter.com/mUL7979BOE
— Okotoks Dawgs Baseball (@Okotoks_Dawgs) August 18, 2024
Graham Brunner got the start in his final appearance in his seventh season with the Dawgs. The southpaw pitched 4.2 innings, striking out seven.
“I definitely got flashbacks to 2017 when I got my first start here,” Brunner said. “I’m always going to remember my last game, for sure, that was incredible.”
Okotoks had a 3-0 lead in the early going with Jarrett Burney, Tucker Zdunich and Logan Grant delivering RBI knocks. Moose Jaw evened the score in the fifth on one swing of the bat with clean-up hitter Nate Mensik hitting a two-run home run.
The Dawgs regained the lead on a Zdunich sacrifice fly and run on a throwing error before the Millers rallied again with two runs in the eighth.
Okotoks pitcher Easton Corey picked up the victory in the series clincher with 1.2 innings out of the bullpen to tee up the walk-off heroics in the bottom of the ninth.
The Dawgs took Game 1 of the best-of-three final by a 7-4 score Thursday night at Seaman Stadium led by a six-run second inning. Moose Jaw countered with a thrilling 8-7 comeback win over Okotoks in Game 2 Friday night in Saskatchewan. The Express rallied with five runs in the eighth to extend the series.
If the script sounds familiar, Okotoks won the 2022 championship series over Moose Jaw in a three-game set, clinching the title at Seaman Stadium.
A WCBL playoff record crowd of 6,341 took in Game 3 on Saturday.
“We all told the coaches it’s better when we win at home,” said Dawgs infielder Ricky Sanchez, a sparkplug all playoffs for Okotoks. “It’s in front of your people, in front of your fans, the guys all have your back and I think it’s pretty awesome.
“Every time we scored a couple of runs, they scored, and it never got to a point where we thought we were going to lose. We were going to keep fighting and it’s going to take everybody.”
In the playoffs, Okotoks secured three game series victories over the Sylvan Lake Gulls and Lethbridge Bulls to come out on top in a tough West Division featuring three of the top four teams in the regular season standings.
“We’ve had to play every single game and everybody we’ve played has been really hard competition,” Brunner said. “The league is getting a lot better, we’re getting better and hopefully they’ll continue the trend next year.”
The Dawgs’ pitching and defence combined to limit opposition to no more than five runs in six of their nine playoff games.
Okotoks won its three most recent championships, 2023, 2022 and 2019, at home. The team’s previous three-peat of championships occurred during its first three seasons in Okotoks from 2007-09.
Twelve players have been part of the three-peat redux from 2022-24: pitchers Brunner, Cade Herrmann, Brody Forno, Quinn Tocheniuk, Seth Thompson and Ryan McFarland along with position players Sanchez, Crowson, Brendan Luther, Aidan Rose, Alejandro Cazorla and stalwart catcher Caleb Lumbard.
“It’s not easy winning three in a row,” Crowson said. “I think it’s that we’ve all been there and when we’re playing at home, you’re not going to beat us at home in front of these fans.
“We just find a way to win every time.”
Going back to the 2019 championship, both Brunner and Sanchez have contributed to four WCBL titles during their time in Okotoks.
“It’s awesome and it shows you the winning culture we have going on in this program,” Sanchez said. “Hard work pays off, a lot of people thought we weren’t going to do it and we did it. We played nine games and it wasn’t easy.”
Brunner, a Dawgs pitcher since the 2017 season, got to experience a first in his fourth title.
“This is the first year I’ve actually celebrated the win,” he said. “Every other time I’ve been pitching in the playoffs and had to go (back to school) the next day after I threw.
“It’s pretty awesome and a great way to end it with a walk-off bomb.”
