It’s official: there will be a new Intercounty Baseball League (IBL) champion in 2024.
Thursday’s 12-3 win by the Guelph Royals at Welland Stadium in game five of the IBL semifinals sets up a clash with the Barrie Baycats for the Jack & Lynne Dominico Cup. This will be the first time Barrie and Guelph meet in the IBL Finals.
Barrie enters the finals for the second consecutive year aiming for the franchise’s eighth title (2005, 2014-19). 2023’s series ended in a six-game loss to the Welland Jackfish. Unlike that series, Barrie holds home-field advantage in 2024, having finished second in the regular season standings (27-15). Guelph ended the summer campaign in fourth at 24-18.
After a heartbreaking end to Barrie’s championship run in 2023, coming within a strike of taking a commanding 3-1 series lead, the team knew what it took to get back to this point. Fourth-year manager Josh Matlow stated ahead of the team’s first-round series with the Toronto Maple Leafs that the game plan was to get an early lead, and that has been a common theme throughout their postseason.
Not only have the Baycats swept their way through the playoffs, they haven’t trailed at any moment in any of the six playoff games. Further to that, they’ve only been tied for ten full innings across those games. A big part of that is a total of 85 hits in the playoffs so far – an average of just over 14 per game – with just six home runs included in that total. All culminating in an opponent’s earned run average of 9.00 so far in the postseason.
“I think we’re a lot stronger this year than we were last year,” Matlow said after the Baycats’ semifinal sweep of the London Majors. “I just said to them ‘lock-in, it’s time'. This is what we play for… it’s everything any manager dreams of.”
Meanwhile, Barrie’s starting pitching is just as consistent in the playoffs as in the regular season. Those early leads have given two wins each to Frank Garcés, Cesar Rosado, and Juan Benítez, while that rotation has averaged seven innings pitched per start and only allowed four total earned runs. During the regular season, those three arms were no strangers to pitching beyond the seventh inning stretch, and were all ranked in the top six in league ERA.
The Royals have not been to the IBL Finals since 2004 when they beat the London Majors in five games to claim the second of back-to-back championships and the franchise’s ninth total. It wasn’t until the first-round sweep of the Chatham-Kent Barnstormers that Guelph had its first playoff series win since 2012. However, manager Dino Roumel carries plenty of IBL championship experience with him.
“It’s going to show on the field because guys are going to hate letting each other down and you’ll get that little extra effort looking out for each other,” Roumel said when he was re-introduced as manager in 2019. “You don’t have to fight, but you fight for each other."
Roumel led the Royals to three IBL championships in a previous managerial stint, as well as a title as the team’s general manager in 1997, one as Toronto’s manager in 2007, and another as a coach with the Brantford Red Sox in 2013.
Guelph’s offence has been just as impressive, posting double-digit hit totals in all eight playoff games so far. Timely hitting and crooked numbers were a big theme for the Royals, especially in the series against the Jackfish. Game five provides the perfect example in which Andy
Leader’s three-run homer capped off a four-run sixth inning that turned a 3-2 deficit into a 6-3 lead, with a six-run frame in the ninth blowing it open further to give the Royals a 12-3 win.
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BY THE NUMBERS
Barrie (playoffs): .370 AVG, .981 OPS, 6 HR, .387 RISP, 3.50 ERA, .217 OAVG
Guelph (playoffs): .329 AVG, .892 OPS, 8 HR, .290 RISP, 2.47 ERA, .221 OAVG
Head to head: Guelph won the season series 3-2 (34-19 RD), 1-1 @BAR, 2-1 @GUE
WHO TO WATCH
A midseason change of scenery has been the foundation of major in-season improvement from infielder Carson Burns, who was traded midseason to the Royals from the Baycats after parts of six seasons in Barrie. He was hitting just .149 through 14 games with Barrie in 2024, he hit .276 with Guelph in eight regular season games. He’s been hitting behind slugger Josh Garton in the Royals’ lineup, which provides plenty of opportunities with runners on base considering Garton has been walked 12 times in the playoffs, including four intentionally.
Burns’ only game against Barrie after the trade was arguably his best performance of the season. He went 3-for-5 with a home run, his first since 2022, leading his new team to a 15-3 win. However, that game was in Guelph, meaning game one of the IBL Finals will be his first time in front of the Barrie crowd in a Royals uniform.
Due to the explosive offensive showing from the Baycats, and the durability of the starting rotation, closer Carlos Sano hasn’t pitched much in high-leverage situations. He’s had one save opportunity in these playoffs, which he converted in a 4-3 win in game two against Toronto, a game manager Josh Matlow called one of the most intense he’s ever been a part of. Aside from that, he’s only had one other save situation since the beginning of August.
Surely, he would’ve had more high-leverage opportunities if he hadn’t missed four games due to suspension late in the season. His three appearances in the semifinal series against London all began with at least a five-run lead, and he’s only allowed one earned run in those three innings. He has the capability of being a two-inning closer, but should he come in to close out a game in the finals, it’ll be hard to predict how reliable he’ll be with the lack of recent high-pressure innings, especially against the Royals, who he hasn’t faced in 2024.
SCHEDULE
- Game 1: at Vintage Throne Stadium, Barrie — Sunday 9/8, 6:05 pm EDT
- Probable starters: Kyle Thomas, GUE (2-0) vs. Frank Garcés, BAR (2-0)
- Game 2: at David E. Hastings Stadium, Guelph — Tuesday 9/10, 7:30 pm EDT
- Probable starters: Cesar Rosado, BAR (2-0) vs. Jacob Kush, GUE (0-0)
- Game 3: at Vintage Throne Stadium, Barrie — Thursday 9/12, 7:35 pm EDT
- Probable starters: TBD vs. TBD
- Game 4: at David E. Hastings Stadium, Guelph — Saturday 9/14, 7:30 pm EDT
- Probable starters: TBD vs. TBD
- *Game 5: at Vintage Throne Stadium, Barrie — Sunday 9/15, 6:05 pm EDT
- *Game 6: at David E. Hastings Stadium, Guelph — Tuesday 9/17, 7:30 pm EDT
- *Game 7: at Vintage Throne Stadium, Barrie — Thursday 9/19, 7:35 pm EDT
*if necessary
