Silver Lining for St. Clair Saints Women’s Softball at Provincials
The St. Clair College Women’s Softball team turned in a Silver Medal performance at the OCAA Provincial Championship which was played at Etobicoke’s Connorvale Park this weekend who pushed host Humber Polytechnic to the limit after forcing a second game in the gold medal round Saturday afternoon.
The Saints entered the weekend as #2 seed with a 15-5 regular season record and drew Humber Friday afternoon who needed to win Thursday’s play-in game to advance to the final four weekend. St. Clair battled back from a 5-run deficit twice and scored two runs in the final frame but stranded the tying baserunners in a 7-5 loss. Ada Umerah (Maple, ON) homered for the Saints earning Player of the Game honours while Brooke Cameron (Rimbey, AB), Kamryn Coombs (Atwood, ON) and Zahnyah Jackson (Brampton, ON) had two hits apiece. Danna Juarez (Airdrie, AB) suffered the pitching loss but struck out 9 batters over seven innings of work for the Saints.
St. Clair then played back-to-back and faced elimination against 4th seed Sheridan College (Brampton) in the double knockout format but were able to survive a bases loaded jam in the 7th inning and prevail 5-4 which advanced the Saints to the medal round on Saturday. St. Clair’s Jackson was named Player of the Game for her quality behind the plate in addition to a pair of singles. Coombs had a double with two RBI for the Saints and teammate Ashley Marchand (Fergus, ON) drove in a run on two doubles. Ashton Fong (Colwood, BC) picked up the pitching win for St. Clair surrendering just two earned runs while going the distance.
Saturday afternoon the Saints faced off against rival and top seed Durham College (Oshawa) who were saddled with a shutout loss against Humber the previous day. Umerah moved St. Clair ahead in the first inning with a 3-run homer and the Saints were up 4-0 before Durham got on the board with a single run in the 4th inning. Umerah put the game out of reach with another solo homerun in the 5th to complete the scoring at 5-1 allowing St. Clair to play for gold. Umerah collected Player of the Game recognition again for the Saints while teammate Chloe Cole (LaSalle, ON/St. Thomas of Villanova) was 3-for-3. Juarez was solid on the pitching strip for St. Clair giving up just five hits and a walk over seven innings on her way to the win.
To claim the title, the Saints would have to topple Humber twice in the gold medal round and started that bid extremely well with a 12-1 mercy in the first contest. St. Clair needed just five innings to bash 11 hits with Fong only giving up five hits and no earned runs to go with a pair of strikeouts. Coombs was named Player of the Game and thumped the big blast in the 2nd inning with a grand slam homer that put the Saints ahead 7-1. Cole was perfect at the plate again going 2-for-2 with two RBI and two runs scored for St. Clair. Taylor Kana (Springfield, ON), Umerah and Cameron each also had two hits for the Saints.
In the deciding game St. Clair’s Umerah took another ball deep over the fence for her fourth dinger of the championship which cut a Humber lead in half at 2-1 in the second inning. But that would be as close as it would get as Humber used a 5-run 4th inning to put the game out of reach. Humber added two more in the 7th inning before the Saints completed the scoring with a solo homerun from Marchand in the bottom half which gave her Player of the Game recognition. St. Clair only managed three hits in the contest while giving up 12 to the Hawks. Four of the nine runs against were charged to the St. Clair pitchers which were split evenly between the starter Fong (2 IP) and reliever Juarez (5 IP).
Umerah and Coombs were named to the Championship All-Star team distinguishing their stellar play throughout the weekend.
The Saints finished the 2025 season with a 23-10 overall record including playoff and exhibition play.