Joudrs Prague and Žraloci Ledenice on top of Czech Softball
Joudrs Prague and Žraloci Ledenice are the 2021 Czech National Champions for Women's and Men's Softball.
Joudrs Prague is the Women's Extraleague Champion for the second year in a row. After an excellent regular season, winning 21 of the 28 games they played. Joudrs Prague topped Eagles Prague in the semifinals in three games (9:2, 6:2, 11:7) to access the finals.
In the best-of-five series, the Joudrs faced the newly-promoted Arrows Ostrava and won the Czech National title in three games (7:1, 6:4, 10:2). The American pitcher Taylor Ann Edwards lead the team, pitching in every game of the playoffs and obtaining 5 wins.
Czech Women's Extraleague CHAMPIONS ???? Joudrs Prague ???? pic.twitter.com/BGg7CUMS9F
— Czech Softball (@czechsoftball) October 10, 2021
Silver medalist Arrows Ostrava, at the first appearance in the Extraleague since 2012, gained a spot in the 2022 Women's Softball European Cup Winners Cup, defeating Veronika Peckova's Žraloci Ledenice.
Julie Coufalová (Joudrs Prague) and Michaela Pecková (Žraloci Ledenice) battled the whole season to gain the lead in the homeruns category of the Czech Extraleague. Pecková hit 9 home runs, while Coufalová hit 10, three of which she hit in one game of the final series. Both athletes placed at the top of the HR leaders' stats of the Women's Extraleague history.
In the Men's Extraleague, Žraloci Ledenice won the Czech National Champion Title, the second one in their history after 2019.
Having ranked first in the Top-6 group, Žraloci Ledenice could choose which team to face in their playoffs: they picked the Hippos from Havlickuv Brod as their quarterfinals opponent and then Painbusters Most as their semifinals opponent.
In the final series, Žraloci Ledenice defeated the Beavers Chomutov in a best-of-three series, losing game one and winning games two and three (0:5, 7:0, 4:0). The Czech fans could witness a great battle between the pitchers: Jonáš Hajný for Ledenice and Marek Malý for Chomutov.
Men's Extraleague Champions 2021 ???? pic.twitter.com/Ud2mB4E5a6
— Czech Softball (@czechsoftball) October 23, 2021
The silver medalists were the Beavers Chomutov, and the Locos Břeclav got the bronze medal, defeating the Painbusters Most.
Czech ace-pitcher Michal Holobrádek announced that the 2021 season was the last one wearing the Hippos's jersey after 10 years. Starting in 2022, Holobrádek will play for his hometown club Locos Břeclav, alongside pitcher Osička to recreate the pitchers' duo we saw in the final game of the 2021 Men's European Championship for Czech Republic.