PHILADELPHIA- St. Joseph’s Prep baseball jumped to an early lead, but No.1 seed Father Judge flexed its muscles late, scoring 5 runs in the last two innings to give the Crusaders a 7-4 victory.
Having already clinched the top spot in the Philadelphia Catholic League Playoffs, Father Judge stepped onto the field Monday afternoon at FDR Park with every intention of winning.
On the other side of the diamond, St. Joseph’s Prep missed an opportunity to gain ground in the standings. The Hawks are looking at a double header on Saturday in order to win a spot in the PCL playoffs.
The game had an unusual first few innings. Both teams took out their starting pitchers before the beginning of the third inning.
In the top of the second, pitcher Colin Scanlon was clearly uncomfortable on the mound for the Hawks’. Constantly stretching his back and lower body, Prep's head coach Joe Falcone quickly recognized what was going on and called a time out.
After a long chat at the mound Scanlon left the game at the request of his coach.
“With the playoffs coming up, having to use him today, but then knowing we are going to have to use him again on Saturday, we kind of figured it was best to shut him down and go from there. I mean this was a big game for seeding, but more important that he’s able to pitch Saturday,” said Falcone.
Top of the 2nd, the Hawks brought in relief pitcher Pat Woltemate.
Woltemate got off to a slow start allowing a few hits and a run, giving the Crusaders an early 1-0 lead heading into the bottom of the 2nd.
Judge replaced their starting pitcher Nick Newbert in the 2nd inning as well, a move that almost cost them.
Bottom of the 2nd, #17 Chris Higgins entered the game for the Crusaders and came out strong, securing the first 2 outs of the inning.
The Prep eventually loaded the bases and with the help of #4 Luke Donaphon’s bases clearing double, put 4 on the board. The Prep took a 4-1 lead heading into the 3rd.
Top of the 4th, the game was still 4-1 in favor of the Prep, but the momentum was about change.
Number three Vinnie Stasiak stepped up to bat for Judge, and with one huge swing, roped a liner into the right center field gap for a triple.
Next up, #21 Tim Ulrich scored Stasiak with a RBI groundout to shortstop to make it 4-2 game.
The Crusaders put two men on in the fifth but were unable to drive them home.
Top of the 6th, Father Judge was down to its last 6 outs to rally a comeback. Trailing 4-2, the Crusaders put another two runners on base and was once again within striking distance.
After a tough at bat, Woltemate recorded the second out and was on the brink of escaping another inning with no damage done.
Father Judge vs. St. Joe's Prep
The next man up for Father Judge was #10 Tom Penko.
Penko lined one up the middle and drove home the two base runners tying the game at 4-4. The Hawks avoided any more damage and eventually worked their way out of the inning.
After making quick work of the Prep’s batters in the bottom of the 6th, the Crusaders had no intention of going into extra innings.
Top of the 7th, Judge’s #9 Christian Lutz got his team off to a near perfect start as he stroked a double down the right field line.
“Christian does a great job of attacking the fastball, and being aggressive,” said Judge’s head coach Ken Devenney. “He also has a real nice downward swing where he’s not trying to hit the ball as far as he can, he’s trying to hit the ball as hard as he can.”
With a runner in scoring position, the Crusaders looked to take the lead by advancing the runner to 3rd with a sacrifice bunt. The bunt forced the Prep into a tough play that would have needed a perfect throw in order to get the lead runner out at 3rd.
With two men on base and no outs, all the Crusaders needed to do was to drive home the runner in scoring position.
Stasiak stepped up to the plate and hit the ball almost identically to Lutz’s; down the right field line to score the game-winning run.
The Crusaders tacked on two more runs that inning winning the game 7-4.
“They’re a good team, they find ways to win, and they’ve found ways to win all year. And it looked like maybe 2nd, 3rd time through the line-up facing Pat, they put some good swings on him and got a couple runs. And then in that last inning, we kind of tried to manage it and kind of keep it close so that if we had a chance in the 7th, which we got a couple guys on but when your down 3 it’s really hard, it’s really hard to come back down 3 in the last inning,” said Falcone.
Even though Judge had clinched first place in the PCL line-up last week winning that spot against Archbishop Wood, Devenney’s, approach to every game remains consistent.
“We talk about breaking the 7 inning game into three different games. Innings 1 through 3, 4 through 5, 6 and 7, and we say that if you win 2 out of the 3 of those games within the game you put yourself in a great spot to win the game” said Devenney.
“We were able to win the last two parts of the game that put us out on top.”
Going into the PCL playoffs this Saturday, Devenney knows his team must remain diligent.
“What we have to watch is the teams we’re going to be playing, we beat, so we got to watch that we don’t think that they’re just going to roll over and say, “hey it’s Father Judge, Father Judge is here. it’s a loss”. We have to compete every day. We have to have all our guys keep picking it up and playing team baseball,” said Devenney.
The first round and the Quarterfinals of the PCL Baseball Championship begin this Saturday, May 21st.