Archbishop Wood shows resolve, walks off against Hallahan

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WARMINSTER >> Gianna Lancellotti stepped to the plate in the bottom of the seventh inning ready to win a game for her team.

The Archbishop Wood junior shortstop dug in with two runners on, two outs and her team down a run to visiting John W Hallahan on Tuesday. Lancellotti didn’t get the winning hit, but her double brought home the tying run and extended the game.

Kylee Guerrera finished off in the next at-bat, lacing a walk-off single to shallow left field to give the Vikings a 5-4 PCL win and ensuring themselves of a home playoff game next week.

“We just got pumped up and confident and it helped us out a lot,” Lancellotti said. “Our new field, it’s so much better for us to play on, we’re here at the school and when we win on this field, it’s just such a better feeling for us.

“You always want to win the game for your team, so I just tried to do my best in that spot.”

With the way Wood has played on its new home field, getting the guaranteed game there was a big boost to a squad that’s been showing a lot of fight the last week and a half. Wood entered Tuesday’s game as the No. 4 seed in the PCL standings with Hallahan just one spot behind, so it was already a pivotal contest.

The Vikings have been without two starters since last week’s loss to Lansdale Catholic. Outfielder Cara Coughlin is out for the season with a shoulder injury while ace pitcher Marisa Browne went down with an ankle injury in the same game.

While Wood is hopeful Browne, a Drexel recruit, will be able to return for the playoffs, her injury caused a lot of shake-up in the lineup.

“These girls, since Marisa and Cara went down, they’ve been non-stop fighting for everything and I just told them to keep on fighting and we can do it,” Wood coach Jackie Ecker said. “Some of the girls have changed positions. They just don’t give up, we’ve been concentrating on hitting and with a different pitcher, we’ve worked more on fielding and they just stepped up and did what they had to do.”

Freshman Deana Campbell, normally a starting outfielder, has diligently and valiantly stepped into the pitching circle while the Vikings have shuffled the outfield to compensate losing two of its three mainstays. Campbell gutted her way through Tuesday’s win, giving up six hits and battling through some tough spots.

Even after a pair of Wood errors in the sixth inning allowed Hallahan to turn a 3-2 deficit into a 4-3 lead, Campbell stayed focused and composed. She not only got out of that inning, but came back with a door-shutting seventh to give her offense a chance to win the game.

“We always stick together and there’s a strong pact between all of us,” Campbell, a right-hander, said. “It was tough at first, I was a little nervous but the girls really stood by me and they’re always behind me giving me back-up.”

Hallahan pitcher Madeline McBride had a solid outing, striking out 13 Vikings on a steady diet of rise balls and change-ups but she did not have that type of success against Lancellotti. The shortstop, who Ecker said is batting close to .475 for the season, put Wood on the board with a two-out solo home run in the first inning.

Lancellotti got all of a pitch and although she pulled it foul, the junior knew she had things dialed in then launched a later pitch over the fence in left field. The shortstop went 3-for-4 with two RBI and felt really, really good about the swing she put on her seventh inning double.

“I attribute it to the rest of our team pumping me and the rest of the hitters up, not thinking too hard about it and just going out and doing it,” Lancellotti said. “I felt it as I was hitting the foul ball, it was there today.”

Wood added two runs in the third inning thanks to an RBI double by Rachael Burns and a Hallahan error. While the visitors were putting runners on, Campbell kept working around them and threw four shutout innings to start the game.

Hallahan was putting some good swings on balls and finally got a couple to drop in the fifth. A passed ball allowed one run to score before Mia Viola belted an RBI triple to cut Wood’s lead to 3-2 before Campbell retired the side.

Back-to-back errors led to a sac fly and RBI groundout in the sixth, putting Wood down a run and testing their resolve again.

“I don’t like to give up on myself and when I have them behind me, it’s hard for me to give up on myself,” Campbell said. “They welcomed me in really quickly, it’s a great group of girls.”

Ecker used the word “resilient” to describe Campbell while the freshman credited her effort to her teammates. Campbell said the players behind her have been constantly encouraging her since she took over for Browne early in the loss to Lansdale Catholic last week and it’s helped her get through some tough spots.

After Campbell kept Hallahan quiet in the top half of the seventh, Amanda McKenna gave the offense life with a leadoff double in the bottom half of the frame. The junior, a call-up from the JV squad to help the Vikings counter for their injuries, ripped a pair of doubles Tuesday.

“She has just stepped up for us,” Ecker said. “She was hitting well for JV and I told her I needed her to hit varsity pitching and she’s a very confident player and said she could do it. Someone asked if I was going to sub her out and I said ‘nope, she’s got this.’”

McBride hit Jules Donchez with one out, putting runners at first and second with Sam Link in running for McKenna. After McBride struck out Burns, Lancellotti stepped up and belted one to deep left-center to score Link for the tying run.

Guerra looked to have the game won with a shot to left field but it drifted foul. It didn’t seem to faze the third baseman, who flared the next pitch into the outfield to bring home the winning run.

Wood finishes the week with nonconference home games against Hatboro-Horsham on Friday and Council Rock North on Saturday.  After that, it’s the PCL playoffs and the homefield advantage the Vikings earned on Tuesday.

“I think that it’s just a field of our own,” Campbell said. “We like to be able to call it home and have it, so we wanted another game to use it.”

ARCHBISHOP WOOD 5, HALLAHAN 4
HALLAHAN 000 022 0 – 4 6 2
ARCHBISHOP WOOD 102 000 2 – 5 8 4
HR: AW – Gianna Lancellotti. 3B: H – Mia Viola. 2B: AW – Amanda McKenna 2, Gianna Lancellotti, Rachael Burns; H – Emma Stokes 2.

Andrew Robinson

Andrew Robinson
Montgomery Media/Lansdale Reporter sports writer.

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