Top senior baseball teams coming to Kelowna for BC champs this weekend

The top senior baseball teams from the major areas in the province are converging in Kelowna this weekend, competing for the B.C. senior baseball championship with a chance to play for the 2012 Canadian championships on the line.

The Kelowna Jays are hosting the eight team tournament with baseball teams from every part of the province.

The Jays have finished third the past two years and will be looking to improve on that standing but they will be in tough against some of the best senior baseball teams in B.C.

The Burnaby Bulldogs head into the tournament as the top seed out of the lower mainland. The Bulldogs are defending B.C. and Canadian senior champions.

Other teams competing along with the Jays and Bulldogs are the Coquitlam Angels, the Trail Orioles, the Prince George Axemen, the Kamloops Sun Devils, the Victoria Mavericks and the Nanaimo Coalminers.

There are no fewer than 15 players appearing in this tournament who played for Team Canada a couple of weeks ago in the World Baseball Challenge (WBC). Two of them are Jays dynamic shortstop Jared Johnson and top pitcher Cory Wood.

Other players to watch include Coquitlam's Shawn Schafer, who held Cuba to one run over seven innings at the WBC, and last years B.C. Senior Baseball Player of the year pitcher Tim Fehr from Burnaby.

Action gets underway at 4 p.m. today (Friday) with the defending champion Burnaby Bulldogs taking on the Kamloops Sun Devils at Elks Stadium. The Jays open the event at 6:30 p.m. tonight when they host the Prince George Axmen.

Action resumes at 8 a.m. on Saturday morning and carries through the weekend with the finals being Monday Aug. 1st.

***

The Okanagan junior Athletics are in Nanaimo this weekend for the B.C. Junior Premier Baseball League 2011 championship tournament.

Play begins on Friday with Okanagan taking on No. 1 Langley in the first game of pool play.

On Saturday, the A's will battle Nanaimo and Abbotsford. The top two teams from each of two pools move on to Sunday's playoffs round.

The championship game is set for Sunday afternoon.

Under first-year head coach Ben Fines, the A's (21-27) finished in eighth place at the conclusion of the regular season for their first ever BCJPBL playoff berth.

***

The Rutland Rockies and Kelowna Reds are playing to host the B.C. Bantam AA Baseball Championship this weekend at Edith Gay Park in Rutland.

The 10-team provincial championship began on Thursday with the Rockies taking on the Vancouver Canadians.

The Kelowna Reds' first game is Friday at 9 a.m. vs Chilliwack.

Rutland will play Cloverdale at noon.

Pool play continues until Saturday evening with two games at 6 p.m.

The playoffs will go on Sunday at Edith Gay with the semifinals at 10 a.m., followed by the gold medal game at 2 p.m.