The Brantford Braves were looking for a strong end to their regular season and they got much more than they could have expected.

In their last game of the 2010 Junior Inter-County Baseball League season, the Braves hosted the Woodstock Rangers at Arnold Anderson Stadium on Thursday and sent the visitors packing with a 10-0 mercy defeat in the bottom of the eighth.

Unfortunately for the Braves, they will be unable to qualify for the playoffs, currently sitting in sixth with three games to play in the regular season.

However, the Braves will attend the Ontario Elimination Tournament in Windsor on the August long weekend and coach Shawn Boyle said their hard work and recent fluency would bode well for the tournament.

“Hopefully we will take that into the tournament,” he said. “Our work’s paying off. We’re playing all round, everything was kind of there.”

The Braves started 21-year-old Colin Buckboroug on the mound, a call down from the Brantford Red Sox, who said his game time with the juniors has helped in the lead up to the Intercounty Baseball League playoffs.

“It’s been good. I wasn’t expecting coming into this year I’d be pitching for them,” Buckboroug said. “The Red Sox have so many pitchers, it’s tough to get time with them, but with playoffs ahead I’ll be getting some games.”

The home team started its scoring early in the contest, breaking the 0-0 tie in the bottom of the second with three runs on a wild pitch, walk in and sacrifice fly by Kyle Poirier.

Rangers pitcher Brendan Burns appeared to have control issues, but was kept in for five innings, allowing seven runs (five ERA) and throwing just one strike. He was replaced by Brad Van Hooren in the sixth. Van Hooren threw three strikeouts, one walk and had two ERA.

The Rangers also had issues at bat, recording just four hits.

The Braves tallied three runs in the second, four in the fourth and one each in the fifth, sixth and eighth. RBIs were scored by Iggy Villalobos, Zach Byron, Scott Mann (2), Dan Penfold, Cal Pasinek and Poirier.

Buckboroug threw seven innings with one walk, nine strikeouts, three hits against and one hit batter. Tim Reidy threw one inning.