CB West outlasts North Penn in 11

TOWAMENCIN >> It was the bottom of the 11th inning, and hard-throwing left-hander Matt Peralta struck out North Penn’s Alex Peterson for out number one, then won a lengthy battle with Kadar Namey, striking out the Knights’ third baseman for out number two.

Victory was suddenly within the Bucks’ grasp. Peralta beared down one last time and got Greg Kerr to send a sky-high pop up toward short.

“That was in the air forever, man,” the West senior lefty said with a laugh afterwards.

Everything was worth the wait on this day for the Bucks. Shortstop Steven Gebre secured the catch for the final out of the contest, as West earned its first win of the season in dramatic fashion, outlasting North Penn 2-1 in an 11-inning Suburban One League Continental Conference marathon at North Penn.

“Our first conference win, over the defending state champs,” Peralta said. “It’s a good one.”

From beginning to end, this was a game dominated by outstanding pitching, with Knights starter Matt Stevenson retiring the first 16 batters he faced, throwing a perfect game into the sixth.

Nick Evans broke it up with a line-drive single to center, but Stevenson got right back into form, getting a strikeout and a flyout to end the inning. Stevenson would throw nine shutout innings for the Knights (5-3, 2-2 conference).

The Bucks counter-punched with Luke Irons. The starting right-hander limited the Knights to three hits in his seven innings of work, as these two rivals headed towards sundown, deadlocked at zero.

“Luke was phenomenal,’” Bucks coach Brad Tracy said. “About the eighth or ninth inning, one of the assistant coaches and I said ‘hey, we wanna win this game, but this is a really good baseball game.’

“North Penn’s very well-coached — I’ve known Kevin (Manero) for a very long time.”

The game would remain scoreless until the 10th, when Gebre singled off NP reliever Zach Thomas and eventually scored on an error on a pick-off attempt, providing the Bucks (1-4, 1-3 conference) a 1-0 edge.

North Penn, however, looked ready to win it in the bottom half. After Bucks reliever Jake Manca retired North Penn in order in the eighth and ninth, the Knights came out swinging in the 10th, with Kerr immediately ripping a single to left and Matt Marino following up with a single to the same spot.

Grant Silhanek’s bunt down the third-base line was a thing of beauty, giving North Penn the bases loaded with no outs.

On came Peralta.

“My idea was to just get in there and throw strikes and see what happens,” the senior said. “There was no outs and (North Penn) was in a good position to win the game. We just battled back, made a couple good plays and got out of it.”

Peralta struck out leadoff man Zack Miles then surrendered a walk to Nate O’Donnell, tying the game at one apiece. But then Bucks second baseman Nick Evans snared a line drive by Mason Nadeau for the second out, and then — with the count full — Peralta struck out Jake Schuster to end the inning.

“Bases loaded, nobody out, and to give up only one run,” Tracy said, “that won the game for us right there.”

Thomas Phillips’ two-out, RBI single in the top of the 11th pushed the Bucks back in front, 2-1, with Peralta ready to close it out.

“We go down, get a run, and when we got back out there, we were pumped,” he said. “We knew we were gonna win that game.”

Peralta then got those two strikeouts to start the bottom of the 11th.

“They kept trying to tell me to throw a curveball,” he said with a smile, “but I wasn’t too confident with that at the time, so I was just shaking it off for fastball and just trying to blow it by them.”

After Gebre secured the final out, the Bucks’ bench rushed onto the field in celebration. Hugs and high fives — after a win like this — were certainly in order.

Said Peralta of the victory: “We have a game (Thursday at home against Hatboro-Horsham) so we’re gonna try to keep it rolling.”

North Penn is also back at it Thursday, at home against Pennridge.

“We got a great job from our starting pitcher and from our defense,” Manero said, “but we just left too many opportunities on the bases. Quite frankly, we struck out too much. We have to do a better job of putting the ball in play, shortening up our swings a little bit and taking a little bit better approach.

“It was definitely a frustrating loss. Their pitcher did a nice job of changing eye level, taking advantage of the strike zone, but as a team that we feel we are, we have to find a way to win that game by a run, not lose it.”