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By Scott Huff
NEWTOWN – Council Rock South southpaw Greg Welsh struck out his eighth hitter to culminate a 12-0 Golden Hawk victory over CR North – and the junior was lost in a pile of wildly celebrating teammates moments later on the mound.
And it was hard to distinguish exactly what are the excitement was about.
Was it that Welsh had fired a six inning no-hitter? Was it that CR South had won the SOL National Conference championship? Or was it that the Golden Hawks had just beaten their intra-district rival?
“I think it was a little of all of that,” smiled Council Rock South head coach Greg Young. “The players wanted to see Greg throw the no-hitter – we wanted to win the championship – and we wanted to beat North.
“After we lost to Pennsbury last Wednesday, the players were going to be ready to play this game,” said Young. “We talked about playing with intensity, playing with energy, and playing with emotion. We did all of those things today.”
CR South (12-1) needed a win over CR North (10-3) to assure the Hawks of an outright championship. But the 12-0 final must have been as a surprise to the large crowd that circled the North home field.
“South played a flawless game,” said Council Rock North coach Dan Kusters. “But they didn’t win a league title for what they did today, but for what they did for the entire season.
“They have some tough bats in the lineup,” added Kusters. “And their pitcher threw a gem.”
Indeed.
Welsh allowed just a single base runner when he issued a walk to North’s Ryan Venner with two outs in the second inning.
“I have never thrown a no-hitter before,” said Welsh. “I really didn’t know I had the no-hitter until I saw that we had scored 10-runs and could end the game in the sixth inning.
“I just wanted to throw strikes and get outs,” continued Welsh. “Plus the defense made some plays behind me.”
The defensive play of the game came when North’s Ryan Hartley smoked a line drive off Welsh’s ankle in the fifth inning that bounded to shortstop Bill Fleming. Fleming fired to first to nip Hartley and preserve the no-no.
“(Fleming) came up to me after the game and told me I owe him,” said Welsh. “Maybe I’ll have to buy him something at Applebees.”
As impressive as the pitching performance turned in by Welsh was the offensive performance turned in by the Hawk hitters.
South took a 2-0 lead in the first inning when Max Wieler drilled a two-out, two-run homerun.
“I had never hit Wieler in the number four hole before today,” said Young. “And I didn’t tell him about it until right before the game.”
“I was pretty excited to get the chance to hit in that spot,” said Wieler. “It was my first homerun of the year, and to hit it against North felt real good.”
South added a solo run in the second inning on an RBI single by Jerry Mulderig. Catcher Alex Tomlinson had opened the inning with a double.
The Golden Hawks scored again with two outs in the fourth inning. Mulderig walked and scored ahead of a towering homerun off the bat of Eric Ebert.
South scored seven times in the sixth inning to break the game wide open. Fleming notched a two-run single to highlight the scoring.
“Council Rock North is a great team – a playoff team – and we may see them down the road in the district playoffs,” said Young. “The program at North is a great one, and if we play them again, I expect them to take it to us. Not one kid on that team will back down.”
“This game will fester for a little while,” said Kusters. “It’s easy to compete when you win games – we have to remember this loss.”
You can be sure that Welsh – and his Rock South teammates – will remember their victory.
Council Rock South 2 1 0 2 0 7 - 12 12 0
Council Rock North 0 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 0 1
CR South: Bill Fleming ss 4 0 1 2; Jerry Mulderig 2b 3 2 2 1; Eric Ebert 3b 4 3 3 3; MaxWieler lf 5 2 3 3; Shane Petrellis dh 3 1 0 0; Rob Davis ph 1 0 0 0; Mike Tomeo rf 1 1 1 1; Tom Boyd 1b 3 1 1 1; Alex Tomlinson 4 1 1 0; Paul Difede cf 2 1 0 1. Totals 31 12 12 12
CR North: Matt Hone ss 3 0 0 0; Tyler Farrell c 2 0 0 0; Scott Runzer 1b 2 0 0 0; Tom Filer lf 2 0 0 0; Ryan Hartley 2b 2 0 0 0; Ryan Venner dh 1 0 0 0; Jesse Goldberg rf 2 0 0 0; Benn Parker cf 1 0 0 0; Lee Marvel ph 1 0 0 0; Ryan Maley 3b 1 0 0 0; Kelly Adams ph 1 0 0 0. Totals 18 0 0 0.
2B – {CRS-}Mulderig, Wieler, Tomlinson.
HR – {CRS-} Wieler, Ebert
CR South Inn H R Er K W
Greg Welsh (W) 6.0 0 0 0 8 1
CR North
Alex Goldberg (L) 1.1 3 3 3 0 2
Jared Weed 3.2 6 2 2 2 4
Darin Lauer 0.1 5 7 7 1 3
Alex Sable 0.2 0 0 0 0 0
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