It was a positive weekend to build on for the Quality Foods Parksville Royals as they look ahead to this weekend.
The Royals were on the mainland for a double dip against the Langley Blaze Wednesday (scores not available) and will be back at home for a few days before heading back to the mainland for the weekend, with games against the North Shore Twins and the Whalley Chiefs to wrap up the season.
Squaring off against the best team in the league last weekend, the Langley Blaze, the Royals showed that they weren’t going to be looked over as they narrowly lost game one and pulled off a win in game two, a game which they looked like the better team from start to finish.
“We came out strong against Langley and it really showed in both the games we played last weekend,” assistant coach Bruce Biro said. “All these kids get ready for the games the same way, they all wake up in the morning and get ready to start their day like each other. The only difference is that they’re higher in the standings than we are but we came to play against them.”
Splitting the series with the Blaze last weekend saw the Royals bump the first place team down to second, a game and a half behind the North Shore Twins. The Royals will see the Twins on Saturday, for two of their six games.
“It’s going to be a grind, for sure,” Biro said. “It’s one thing to have two double headers for these guys on Saturday and Sunday with the heat but we seem to be making the right adjustments when it comes to dealing with the amount of energy we need and how to prepare for the heat as of late too. They’ve handled it pretty well.”
Sunday the Royals are in action against the Whalley Chiefs, who sit only three and a half games up on the Royals.
With the remaining games on the schedule all “must wins,” the Royals will be looking to put together some wins, whether it’s against teams at the top of the standings or near the bottom.
“We can’t afford to lose games, plain and simple,” Biro said.
“We know how we’re capable of playing as a team and if we can manage to string some wins together, we’ll jump right in to the playoffs and we can be a team that could surprise a lot of people. We’ve been in the majority of the games we’ve played all year and we have the players that can make that happen on this team.”
Having no more games at home for the rest of the season, the Quality Foods Parksville Royals will have to play some of their best baseball this week and hope to make the playoffs.
