Check out the results for SOL baseball teams in action Wednesday.
QUAKERTOWN 3, CENTRAL BUCKS SOUTH 2
The Panthers – showing a decided flare for the dramatic - were down to their last out when they rallied to stage a miraculous comeback, earning their second win of an unforgettable week.
“You can’t get any closer to a loss – two outs in the seventh inning and down 2-0,” coach Jon Pallone said.
The bases were empty when sophomore John Lilley – who hits out of the nine hole – stepped up to the plate and hit a solo home run to make it a 2-1 game.
“Our guys got a little more energized,” Pallone said. “The whole game we were down and didn’t have the same intensity we had at CB East (a 2-1 win on Monday).
“I think we were a little frustrated. We got the win Monday, and we were hoping to come out and keep steamrolling. I think we ended up pressing a little too much. This is only John Lilley’s third game on varsity. He was up two weeks ago for a non-league game and hit two triples. We sent him back down for the week.
“Going into Monday’s game, I figured we had to try new things. We only had two seniors in the lineup, and today we had three. We have some pretty good athletes, and he’s the fastest kid in the program and might be the strongest. He got a basehit on Monday, and today he got a real timely hit.”
Leadoff batter John Potynski followed and drew a walk, and miscommunication between South’s shortstop and leftfielder allowed freshman Jake Reed’s high popup to fall in untouched for a base hit.
“John was able to run on contact, and he was able to get to third base,” Pallone said. “We have been preaching – run everything out.”
With runners on first and third, Vinny LaCava – the hero in Monday’s win over CB East - stepped into the batter’s box.
“(In that situation), we can either run a play and try and get in a rundown to score the run and tie the game or we can let him hit,” Pallone said. “He’s 2-for-3 already, and he seemed to be seeing the ball today and this week, so let’s let him at least try and tie it up for us.”
On a 2-1 count, LaCava hit a single up the middle, plating the tying running and putting runners on first and second.
“(Then) their pitcher threw a ball in the dirt, and we moved up to second and third,” Pallone said.
An error on Cam Delisle’s hard hit grounder to short allowed Reed to score, putting the Panthers on top 3-2.
Sage Fuhrmeister was relieved by southpaw Zack Metz after he walked the leadoff batter in the seventh. He escaped a jam that saw the Titans put runners on second and third with one out, picking up a huge strikeout and closing it out with a fly ball to left to end the game. The Titans left the bases loaded.
“I said to them after the game today – ‘Our first challenge was to believe in ourselves and believe we belong in the league. Now we need to know we belong, but we can’t just show up and expect things to happen. We have to make them happen,’” Pallone said. “They have been working so hard in the offseason, in the preseason, and during the season, we’re pushing them harder than they have ever been pushed. We’re doing three-hour practices maybe six days a week. That’s a lot different than what they’ve had before, but none of them are complaining. They’re coming out and working.
“To start the season off as rough as we did, they hung in there. Not one person quit the team in general or quit and gave up on us, and that’s a huge credit to the players.”
LaCava finished the day 3-for-4 with an RBI while Lilley was 1-for-2 with a home run, walk and RBI.
For the Titans, Steve Trachtenberg was 2-for-3 with a double and RBI. Mike Anastasia doubled and scored a run. Tanner Pfender was 1-for-3 with an RBI.
Fuhrmeister – in what Pallone called his best start of the season - earned the win, allowing seven hits and two runs while walking two and fanning three.
Quakertown is 2-10 in the league (5-11 overall) while the Titans are 4-7 in league play (5-9 overall).
Quakertown 000 000 3-3
Central Bucks South 000 110 0-2
COUNCIL ROCK SOUTH 4, PENNSBURY 2
Jordan Silverman made all the right pitches, perhaps none bigger than the one he threw to notch a big strikeout with two outs and the bases loaded in the sixth and his Golden Hawk team clinging to a 3-2 lead over the Falcons.
“It was a very good outing,” coach Ted Kirner said. “I’m very proud of him. It was his first home varsity start. It just happened to fall that way, and today he finally got to throw on his home mound in front of his crowd.
“He came and he pitched extremely well. He should be really proud of how he approached the game and got us out of some really tight jams. Overall, it was just a phenomenal team win. It seems like somebody else always steps up for us – somebody gets that key hit, somebody swipes that bag, somebody makes that nice play. I can’t say how much I love this team.”
The Golden Hawks scored three runs in the fourth - two on bases-loaded walks and the third on an RBI single by Dan Ng. The Falcons scored two in the top of the fifth to make it a one-run game. In the bottom of the sixth, Rock South tacked on an insurance run when Nick Ponente delivered a sacrifice fly.
Senior Matt Walsh closed it out with a scoreless seventh, allowing the Golden Hawks (10-4, 8-3 SOL) to maintain their one-game lead in the National Conference standings with three league games remaining.
“We have done a pretty good job of putting ourselves in a position to be successful,” Kirner said. “We get a lot of base runners, and we like to put a lot of pressure – it’s kind of our style of baseball, and today they were able to execute.
“They found a way to get some key hits, and we made some good defensive plays. It’s a phenomenal win coming off a tough loss at Neshaminy where everything didn’t seem to go our way, and that’s the beautiful thing about this game. I’m extremely proud of my guys for just understanding that - not trying to re-write the books but coming back out and playing our kind of baseball and finding ourselves in the win column again.”
The Falcons are 7-5 in league play (8-8 overall).
Pennsbury 000 020 0-2
Council Rock South 000 301 x-4
CENTRAL BUCKS EAST 13, NORTH PENN 0 (5 innings)
After scoring 10 runs in their last six games combined, the Patriots – capitalizing on 12 walks and eight hits – exploded for 13 in Wednesday’s abbreviated contest.
“We hit the ball today,” coach Kyle Dennis said. “We strung hits together and had good at-bats.
“We’ve had a tough time stringing hits together. We’ve hit some balls hard but they weren’t falling in for hits. The guys were getting a little frustrated. Today everything opened up for us, which was really nice to see.”
Pat Reilly was retired on a bullet that was snared by the shortstop to lead off the first. It turned out to be a good omen even though he didn’t reach base.
“When you have a guy square up a ball early, that gives other guys confidence that they can square a ball up too,” Dennis said. “Even though it was an out, it was a hard-hit ball, and the next guy up knows – hey, I can hit the ball hard.”
The Patriots plated a run in the first and then scored seven in the second, capitalizing on walks as well as an RBI single by Brandon Birkhead and a two-run double by Carter Usowski.
“One thing we hadn’t been getting was that hit with runners in scoring position in the past couple games,” Dennis said. “We were able to capitalize having runners on base to score some runs.”
The Knights managed just three hits off winning pitcher Brandon Birkhead, who walked one and fanned seven in a five-inning gem.
Birkhead finished the game 2-for-3 with three RBIs and a run scored, and Thomas Prato was 2-for-3 with two RBIs and a run scored.
“We lost to Quakertown on Monday, and I think that was a little bit of an eye opener for some of the guys,” Dennis said. “They took a good approach to practice the next day. They know we have a tough streak of four games.
“Before today’s game, three of the four remaining games were to teams above us in the standings but not by much. We knew if we could knock everyone down a peg and bring ourselves up a little bit that we’d be in a decent spot.
“We made life a little harder by losing that game Monday. We were excited to get the win against North Penn. We just have to take care of our business. We’ve been pitching great all year. Our team ERA is under three. Our pitchers have been lights out. It’s just the bats kind of disappeared. Hopefully, we carry this over for the next three games.”
According to Dennis, the Patriots (7-6, 6-5 SOL) scored 50-plus runs in their first six games, allowed 19 and went 5-1.
The Knights (9-6, 8-4), Pennridge and Hatboro-Horsham all have four losses in Continental Conference play.
North Penn 000 00-0
Central Bucks East 175 0-13
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