In a word, ‘lucky’.
That’s the feeling that the players, coaches and fans that follow the Lower Macungie Youth Legion team probably felt after a long day of baseball on Tuesday afternoon at the Oley Regional.
Lucky to know: their season isn’t over.
Lucky to know: Despite committing eight errors in one game that somehow, they were able to find a way to win.
Lucky to know: They get to live for another day.
Lower Mac kept its season alive – and its ultimate hopes of reaching the Pennsylvania Junior Legion State Championships – as they avoided elimination on the fourth day of the regional by rallying for a 4-3 win over Norchester.
The win came approximately 30 minutes after head coach Shawn Betz’s team suffered its first loss after falling to Spring Cove in the winners’ bracket final in another tight, one-run game 3-2. The game was resumed in the top of the third inning with the score tied 1-1 after heavy rains came through on Monday night postponing play.
What this all means now, is that on Wednesday Lower Mac must defeat Spring Cove in Game 1 at 11 a.m. and then turnaround and do it again in Game 2 approximately 30 minutes after. Any other scenario and the team located out near Altoona will be crowned the regional champion.
Lower Mac (21-4 overall) will need to play a whole lot better in the field – and improve at the plate with its hitting – to bring home a championship according Betz.
“12 errors in two games, We didn’t play clean baseball and you can’t beat really good teams doing that,” said the team’s fourth-year manager late on Tuesday night. “Two of the three runs we gave up in the first game were unearned and we had four errors, and the three we gave up in the second game were also unearned. If you do that, you’re in trouble.”
“We are very, very lucky to be playing tomorrow,” he added.
Lower Mac, the Lehigh Valley champion, had to rally late in their win over Norchester, the runner-up from the Twin County League, as they scored three runs in the fifth and then added an all-important run in the sixth to rally from an early 2-0 deficit.
Center fielder Jake Fotta’s RBI sac fly scoring Dominick Chiego from third base wound up being the winning run.
Lower Mac managed just four hits in the game off three Bulldog pitchers. Shortstop Evan Amey had half of his team’s hits going 2-for-3. First baseman Andrew O’Brien and second baseman Anthony Viola had the other hits.
Starting pitcher Dylan Witkowski was outstanding on the mound as he remained undefeated on the season (3-0). Witkowski, who was only making his second start, went 6 1/3 innings allowing just four hits, while striking out five. TJ Geist came on in relief in the seventh and picked up the save.
Lower Mac showed a lot resiliency in fighting back from an early deficit after suffering a disappointing loss to open the day against Spring Cove, the runner-up from the Central Penn League.
“It’s hard to win the second game after you lose the first,” said Betz, “especially when the other team (Norchester) was sitting there just waiting for us.”
“The message I said to our players after the loss, is that we have to put that game behind us because the team coming up next is not going to feel sorry for you. For five innings, they felt sorry for us until a key error in the fifth inning turned the game around.”
Spring Cove scored two runs in the top of the third inning as play resumed to take a 3-1 lead, and then held on late to remain as the lone unbeaten in the tournament. Later in the day, they kept their winning streak going as they eliminated Fort Washington 11-5.
Despite the loss earlier today and his team’s shoddy play in the field, Betz feels confident in his team’s chances to not only defeat Spring Cove once, but twice and punch its ticket to Homer City in Indiana County, site of this year’s state championships.
“It’s going to be tough because they like to swing the bats, but with O’Brien pitching I feel very confident and (Tyler) Seidel no-hit for them two innings on Monday before the rains came,” he said. “We just have be clean in the field and we’ll be fine.”
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Lower Mac 4, Norchester 3
LM – 000 031 0 – 4-4-8
No – 011 000 1 – 3-6-5
LM – Dylan Witkowski (6 1/3 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 5 K, 2 BB), TJ Geist (2/3 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K) and Sam Dietz
No – C. Grillo, A. Shanhan (6), D. Blum (7) and K. Isleib
WP – Witkowski 3-0), LP – Shanahan, S – Geist
Spring Cove 3, Lower Mac 2
SC – 102 000 0 – 3-3-0
LM – 100 000 1 – 2-3-4
SC – L. Palmer, M. Watkins (3), T. Oakes (7) and H. Smith
LM – Tyler Seidel, Tyler LePage (3) and Sam Dietz, Dominick Chiego
WP – Watkins, LP – LePage (3-1)