There will be no perfect season for the Carlyle Cardinals of the Saskota Baseball League, but a championship season is still well within their reach. The second-place Cardinals will look to put their first loss of the campaign behind them tonight as they begin the final home-and-home of the season against Kippling. 

That first loss came in a battle of the titans against a fellow unbeaten team, the Estevan Taphouse Wolves. The batters came alive for both sides in a barn-burning 15-10 win for the Wolves on Friday, July 24. 

"We were actually up pretty big early and then we kind of fell apart," said Cardinals player-coach, Brent McLean. "It was our third game in four nights, so we were all pretty tired by that point. They started hitting the ball and we couldn't stop them."

McLean was hoping to see better pitching for tonight's contest against the Royals, but he isn't worried about it. After all, prior to the game against the Wolves, pitching had been a strength for the team all season long, and Carlyle had boasted a lot of strengths.

"A lot will be decided here this last week," he said. "Only ten games (this season) so there's not really a lot separating a lot of the teams right now... We get a couple of wins this week, we'll likely finish in second place so we'll have as good of a shot as anybody."

This will be the last two games of the regular season for Carlyle, and Kippling has a lot to play for. Their 3-4 record puts them in fifth place, right in the middle of the nine-team league, but still with a chance to catch Kenosee, who are right in front of them. 

"We haven't seen them yet so I'm not sure what they've got for players this year," said McLean. "It's kind of hard to say. We'll find out tonight and we actually play them again on Thursday so we've kind of got a home and home with them this week."

Elsewhere in the Saskota league tonight, the Taphouse Wolves will try to keep their hold on first place against a tough Carnduff Astros opponent, while Arcola looks for their first win of the year against the Redvers A's.