Lapuan Virkiä and Manse PP are playing for the women’s Superpesis championship. The final series starts in Tampere on the last day of August.
The top two in the regular season, Manse PP and Lapuan Virkiä, were too tough for the challengers in the women’s baseball quarterfinals. Both teams rushed to the SC finals with 3–0 victories.
For Manselle, defeating Jyväskylä’s Kirittäri in the deciding game 2–0 (6–2, 3–1) was clearly liberating. Tampere defeated Kirittäri for the first time in the playoffs.
The opening period was colored by four brought in runs, having registered by the break Saga-Angelia Raudasojan (2+1) two municipalities. In addition to Raudasoja (at 13/15), the Tampere outfielder who scored two runs was awarded Siri School (at 2/5).
– We got a good start to each match as a gift. The second episodes were always tougher. In the finals, the winner is the one with the hotter bat, summed up Mansen’s game director Manu Vartia already thinking about the finals.
The final matches start on Saturday, August 31 in Tampere. The championship is decided with three wins.
Lapua’s dramatic episode endings
The runner-up in the regular season, Lapuan Virki, showed in the semifinal series that they are a tougher team than Seinäjoki’s Maila-Jussit, even though the visitors experienced a half-judicial killing on Saturday. SMJ should have had a draw in the opening period, but due to a blatant refereeing error, Virkiä won the match 1–0 (3–2, 3–3).
Both teams tied the game in the last inning of the period. The jury rejected SMJ’s equalizing run in the opening period, when the Lapua announcer made the home team believe that the period had already ended.
The resolution of the second episode was just as dramatic. SMJ was one shot away from taking the match to the super innings, until Virkiä’s joker extension Kaisaleena Oukko hit an empty field with the second overtime attack of the kunnar. Joker Janette Lepistö guaranteed the victory by taking home Sauko’s triple jump.
The 1,581 spectators of the match in Tampere and 1,374 in Lapua say that the women’s games are currently almost as interesting events for the public as the men’s playoffs.
In the lower playoffs, the Pöytä Urheilijat defeated the Hamina Balloliijat with a 3–2 victory, dropping HP’s league level lower.