Frontier Gifts finish first at Dustball Tournament

Published 3:01 pm Thursday, June 22, 2017

Juneau’s Frontier Gifts took home the Women’s B division championship at the Dustball Invitational Slo-pitch Tournament over the weekend.

Klondike Rib &Salmon of Whitehorse won the Women’s A division championship. A total of 61 teams competed in the tournament, held annually in Whitehorse, Yukon.

Frontier Gifts defeated the Whitehorse Triple-A Cougars 20-12 in the championship game on Sunday. The Juneau team lost their first game in the double-elimination tournament against the Cougars, who were undefeated prior to Sunday’s championship.

Frontier Gifts player-coach Ginny Martin was amazed at pitcher Linda Taylor’s resiliency throughout the tournament.

“Linda — who normally throws short pitches — was just killing it with her pitches,” Martin said.

Taylor was the oldest player on the team at 72.

Frontier Gifts started the championship game on fire after scoring five runs in the first inning.

“We were just on a roll, man, we got our five runs right away, hitting really well,” Martin said. “And then we got our sixth and they said, ‘Wait that’s five runs.’”

The tournament caps the first six innings of a game at five runs per team — even in championship games — which Martin previously thought was an exception to the rule.

“That kind of deflated us, because here we were on a roll hitting, you know we got six (runs), and then we had to take one off,” Martin said.

After not scoring any runs in second, third and fourth innings, Frontier Gifts scored five in the fifth, two in the sixth and eight in the seventh to take control of the game.

“Everybody was jumping up and down and screaming and yelling,” Martin said of her team’s reaction to winning the tournament.

Martin said she’s been going to the Dustball for over three decades, originally as a player, and now as a player-coach.

“We just like going up there because it gets us out of Juneau to play other teams, we’re not playing the same ones,” she said.

The Rounders, which featured Juneau, Haines and Whitehorse players, also won a championship at the tournament in the men’s C division.

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2017 Dustball Invitational Slo-pitch Tournament Results

Coed A

1.Back Door Sliders

2. Whitehorse Dental Donkeys

3. Slammin Salmons

Coed B

1. Masterbatters

2. Mutts

3. Floor By Floor Rugburns

Coed C

1. All Pro Selects

2. Jim Shockey Predators

3. Sandors

Coed D

1. CRB NightHawks

2. Whitehorse Physio Jays

3. CRB Challengers

Men’s A

1. P &M Recycling Guns

2. Jat’s Diggers

3. Chico’s Bail Bonds

Men’s B

1. Fountain Tire Mudders

2. Brewers

3. Dawson City Dingbats

Men’s C

1. Rounders

2. Territorial Terminators

3. Wolverines

Women’s A

1. Klondike Rib &Salmon

2. AFD Titans

3. Booster Juice

Women’s B

1. Frontier Gifts

2. Triple J’s Cougars

3. Dawson City Snatchers

• Contact sports reporter Nolin Ainsworth at 523-2272 or nolin.ainsworth@juneauempire.com.