It’s been the trademark of the Complete Concrete Athletics – start slow, finish hard.

It was no different Saturday afternoon at the Pepsi Softball Centre when the Athletics unseated defending champions Dave’s Cleaning 16-15 to take the A Division title in the Whitehorse Co-Ed Slo-Pitch League.

Down by four runs heading into the fourth, the Athletics began their upward climb that saw the club put up two runs in the top of the seventh inning to take the lead for the first time and then hold The Crew scoreless in the bottom of the final inning.

“We had our slow bats for the start, but we have been doing that all season,” Athletics coach and outfielder Brett Green said in a post-game interview. “We seem to come from behind every game. We never seem to make it easy on ourselves.”

The MOB earned the B Division title with a decisive 29-4 win over Coke. Medichair Hawks took first in Division 3A, Riverdale Super A Foods won Division 3B, Ace Tune Squad won the Division 4A title and Challenger Geomatics took first in Division 4B.

Green said the Athletics finished the regular season in first place ahead The Crew with only a handful of losses in 20 or so starts. It was, however, the first time in a few years they’ve been able to field a team for the playoffs, as travel and holiday commitments have them left short in years gone by, he explained.

“We didn’t get down on ourselves,” Green said of the early lead established by the The Crew. “Usually the first, second or third innings don’t go our way and it usually takes the fourth, fifth and sixth innings to get our bats together.”

The bats of Athletics Chad Curlew, on the other hand, were hot from the start, with Curlew going five-for-five at the plate.

“He was clutch all game,” said Green.

Hitting by Joe Vigneau and Jeremy Beebe with a three-run, in-the-park-home sparked the Athletics eight-run rally in the sixth to bring the club to within striking distance of The Crew.

Complete Concrete lost their first and only game in the round robin to Dave’s Cleaning who went through to the final with two wins and no losses after gaining a by in the first round because of their second-place finish during the season.

The Whitehorse Dental Donkeys finished in third, with four wins and one loss.

The MOB finished the B Division season in first place and won their first two playoff games before losing their first to Coke Thursday night.

They were ready for their arch-rivals in Saturday’s final, posting back-to-back, 10-run innings to start off the game.

“Everybody hit the ball,” said MOB coach Andrew Schmidt. “It was probably one of our best hitting games of the year. No pop outs, line drives and a couple of home runs.

“Thursday night when we lost to them we just had a melt down and could not get out of it, and they played an incredible game.”

The MOB offence was led by a three-run homer in the first inning off the bat of Ryan McLaren, followed by a two-run shot in the third by Dakota Organ.

Kaylea Wabisca and her “four lights out catches” in the outfield smothered Coke’s offence and were key for the defence, Schmidt said.

“We are a new team but I definitely think we made a name for ourselves this year,” the coach said, adding they’ll be head up to the A Division next year where the competition will be a little tougher.

“It was absolutely a pleasure playing against Coke, and Bud Arnold, he’s a legend.”

The Medichair Hawks finished first in the Division 3A season, but dropped their first game in the playoff round-robin to second-place Glacier Drilling.

The Hawks beat their way back to the final Saturday with four consecutive wins before taking out the undefeated Drilling squad for the division championship.

G & R PawnStars finished third with a record of five wins and two losses, after defeating the Solstice Salmons for bronze.

Riverdale Super A Foods was somewhat a dark horse coming in the Division 3B playoffs, having finished the season in seventh place.

They went through the playoffs undefeated in four games, including the championship game against Advance Security, who finished the regular league in first but had to settle for second on the weekend with a playoff record of three wins and two losses.

Adult Temptations defeated Sandors Sluggers in the game for third place.

After finishing the Division 4A season in first place, the Acme Tune Squad went undefeated in four playoff games to take home the division championship, with their final win coming Saturday against Bailey’s Pub. After finishing the season in sixth, Bailey’s cruised to a silver medal playoff performance on the strength of three wins and two losses.

Sam ‘n’ Andy’s took home third on the weekend.

In Division 4B, Challenger Geomatics came into the playoffs with a first-place season to their credit and they left with the championship after winning four consecutive games, including Saturday’s final against Territorial Contracting.

Having finished the season in seventh, Territorial Contracting won its first two playoff games, lost its third to Challenger, won its fourth and then lost the final.

The Pepsi Seniors finished the 4B playoff championships in third.