The Portage Padres took a 1-0 lead in their best-of-3 Santa Clara semi-final with Plumas thanks to a 7-4 win at Rotary Republic Park.

The Padres and Royals were tied at 1 early in the game, until the Padres broke away to make it 4-1 heading into the top of the 5th. Plumas tied things up in the top of the inning off a couple of errors from the Padres' defense. Portage's Rob Moar got their lead back in the bottom of the 6th with a single run homer, and two more runs scored before the end of the inning. Padres' Pitcher Rod McLeod threw the first 6 innings, while Dustin Donald was brought in to close out the 7th.

McLeod feels they could've been a little better offensively. "The base running, we had a couple of base-running errors that kind of cost us a couple of runs. Other than that we had some timely hits, good pitching, played pretty good D. At times we couldn't get that last out, and that's kind of what hurt us a little bit."

McLeod tossing in the 5th

Pitcher Dustin Donald found himself with the bases loaded and 2 outs in the final inning. He talks about his performance.

"Yeah I wasn't pitching as good as i could, but got through it, got some good outs there and we ended up with the big W."

Plumas' Head Coach Tom Yandeau wasn't disappointed with his club's performance.

"We hit the ball pretty good tonight, and our pitcher threw well. So to come back after being down 3 or 4 there and coming back to tie them up was good, but it just got away from us in the last 6th inning of something like that. We had our chances in the 7th there too, we had the bases loaded, so a timely hit would've helped there too."

The Minnedosa Mavericks and Neepawa Cubs also started their best-of-3 semifinal. The Mavs took that one 4-2.

Game 2 between the Padres and Pirates go Tuesday in Plumas, while the Mavs and Cubs go Monday in Neepawa.