Franklin Township Repeats as District 18 Champions, Defeating Tamaqua

	1	2	3	4	5	6	R	H	E
Tamaqua	0	0	0	2	1	0	3	8	0
Franklin Township	0	0	6	0	0	X	6	4	3

WP: Meek LP: Shannon

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Often times, baseball comes down to one inning. In the case of Franklin Township and Tamaqua, it came down to a six run third inning rally from the home team. Two hits, four walks, a hit by pitch and wild pitch all contributed to the lopsided number that was one of the biggest keys to victory. Myles Meek on the mound sure didn’t hurt, either.

For Tamaqua, it was a story of runners left on base and hitting that, while outdid Franklin Township 8-3, was not as timely as it needed to be in crucial spots.

The top of the first saw Brady Bartzcak walk on a full count pitch out of the zone. Jackson Faust followed with a single up the middle and Brayden Schultz did the same. In between those runners reaching to load the bases, Meek had fanned two. Josh Setlock struck out looking to end the inning and strand the bases loaded.

Myles Meek took four consecutive balls from Evan Shannon to open Franklin Township’s half of the inning. He was thrown out going to second on a nice play from catcher Kroy Tirpak to second baseman Schultz. Jakoby Andrews’ single into center field likely would have scored him, but Andrews ended up stranded on base and the first inning concluded with no score.

Adam Balliet hit a ball through the hole at short to leadoff in the second for Tamaqua. He would be the fourth runner stranded, as the next three all flew out. Shannon struck out the side in Franklin Township’s half, and the game cruised along scoreless through two.

Then Lehighton’s team started doing some uncharacteristic things, like making mistakes. Drake Miller fouled off a couple fastballs, making great contact, before he zipped one over the head of Bryson Brungard at second. Gavin Lutz, the twelfth batter in the lineup bunted right back to Meek. The ball came to Meek so quickly that he turned and fired to Miles Mann covering second, but Mann dropped the ball and both runners were safe. After Meek fanned the next two, Mann bobbled on a ball hit by Jackson Faust. The error scored Miller to put Tamaqua ahead 1-0. After Shannon drove one up the mdidle to load the bases, Meek got Schultz to pop out in foul territory near first base. After three turns at bat, Tamaqua had stranded seven runners, but was leading 1-0.

The wheels then came off for Tamaqua, as Franklin Township began to strike swiftly and severely off of mistakes by their opponent.

It started innocently enough for Shannon. He walked Christian Snyder on a 3-1 pitch and quickly recovered to get Jayce Graham swinging. Brungard then worked a full count walk and Dean Kuhns was plunked by a pitch, allowing the bases to not just be loaded, but be loaded by the bottom of the order to turn the lineup over with one out.

A bouncer came to Schultz at second. Instead of taking the easy flip and sure out at first, he fired home trying to get the lead runner and prevent Snyder from scoring, but the tying run came in. Shannon stayed on the mound but walked Brody Hunsicker on four pitches to force in the go-ahead run. Shannon then threw wild, allowing Kuhns to come home, increasing Franklin’s lead to 3-1. Shannon was then pulled from the mound and moved to right field, as Jackson Faust entered the game.

Manager Travis Hunsicker talked about the big inning, “We’ve talked since day one that little things make a difference in big baseball games. We talk about little things everyday. Moving base runners, productive outs, first pitch strikes, so for us little things are huge and we did a great job of that tonight.”

The nightmare inning didn’t end quickly for Faust, who was greeted by a Jakoby Andrews double that went to the wall in right, bringing home the fourth run of the inning. Jake Kistner brought home two more with his single up the middle. With only two hits, Franklin Township had plated six and had the commanding 6-1 lead.

“We knew coming in, Tamaqua was an excellent baseball team, they played well. We were able to pull it out with one big inning. It’s kind of what we’ve done all tournament–we have a bunch of two out hits and score runs with those two out hits.”

Josh Setlock tried to get his squad going in the fourth with a sharply hit ball that was gloved by Brungard at second. Jaboy Andrews could not glove a ball to him at first, allowing Adam Balliet to reach. Kroy Tirpak put one in right field, and suddenly Tamaqua had a rally going. Jakson Perez brought both runners home as he hit one into left that got by Parker Cummins and rolled all the way to the fence for a triple. The good news for Tamaqua is that they were back in the ballgame, trailing 6-3. The bad news was the Perez 2RBI hit was sandwiched around two strikeouts that ended the rally.

“Myles is mentally tough on the pitchers mound. Nothing distracts him. He’s focused on the mound. He does an extremely good job of throwing first pitch strikes. His demeanor out there–nothing bothers him. He could give up ten straight home runs or strikeout ten in a row and you wouldn’t know the difference. That’s just how he’s built and his character. Credit to him.”

Myles Meek concurred, “”We don’t really make that many errors in a game. All of our pitchers pound the zone and just throw strikes the whole game.”

Against Meek, no more Tamaqua batters would reach base. Having reached the 85 pitch limit, manager Travis Hunsicker called upon Miles Mann to close things out.

When asked if he had wanted to finish the game before running into the pitch count limit, Meek said, “”I didn’t really care–I knew Miles would get the job done for us.”

Meek gave up a single to Shannon. Brayden Schultz then put one in play to Brungard at second who flipped to first; Andrews then tossed across the diamond to get Shannon advancing to third to end the ballgame and send Franklin Township to their second straight district title.

Hunsicker was asked about how special the title was and if one was different from last year’s majors title, “Every championship is special. Championships don’t come everyday. Ben Moyer set the example here a few years back. There are four players on this team who have won four district championships and I don’t think that’s been done before.”

Hunsicker remained humble in his postgame remarks, respecting a team he has seen often in recent years. “Big shoutout to Tamaqua–they are a fantastic baseball team with great pitchers on the mound and hit some balls hard; we just came out ahead tonight.”

Meek talked about his team’s effort, “They all are the best kids on their regular season team and are able to show up for me and then everybody can hit the ball.”

Franklin Township now advances to the Section 6 tournament, where they will face Stroudsburg on Saturday. All Section 6 games will be played at Tamaqua.

“We’re going to enjoy this for the next couple days and focus on Stroudsburg later this week.”