The U-18 AAA Pembina Hills baseball club is looking to defend its championship crown this season.

The club just finished off their tryouts last week and have been preparing for this upcoming season in the Winnipeg Minor Baseball Association before Friday's provincial announcement barred organized team sports. Head coach Ryan Borody describes what the roster is looking like.

"We're going to go with a roster of 15 players for the season, which is probably a little higher than normal," says Borody. "We have a lot of first-year guys who have a lot of potential. I want to see them get some valuable experience with our veteran guys."

Borody says about two-thirds of his players this year are from here in Portage, noting they tend to have a lot of local players most seasons. He notes the initial plan was to get started this weekend but the latest COVID-19 restrictions are pushing that back to at least the end of the month. Despite the delay, Baseball Manitoba's goal is to have provincials return this year.

"We're not sure what the season is going to look like due to COVID," Borody explains. "Right now, Baseball Manitoba is still hoping to have provincial championships in some kind of form. If that doesn't go, the league has told me they will be having some kind of a playoff format, probably similar to last year."

The coach adds they are going for the three-peat this season as they won the provincial championships in 2019 and won the league title last year (no provincials due to COVID-19). He says his expectations remain fairly high for this season.

"We've got a good group of veteran guys returning and our leaders, our third-year guys, are some of the top guys in their age group in the province," says Borody. "Our pitching staff has some really good depth. So, I'm looking for some success."