Taylor, offense put Chichester in Del Val driver’s seat

GLENOLDEN — The last time Chichester won the Del Val League, the team’s senior class was in middle school.

Sophomore ace Zach Taylor was in elementary school.

The drought should be over soon for the Eagles.

Following an impressive 10-5 victory over reigning champion Interboro, Chi claimed sole possession of first place. The Eagles took two of three games with the Bucs this season, and can win the title with wins over Academy Park and Penn Wood.

“I remember I was in eighth grade watching these guys (Interboro) on our field win it,” said senior Ryan Boyers, who played second base and pitched the seventh inning Tuesday. “Every year since then, we kept saying, ‘This is the year, this is the year, this is the year.’ To finally get the Del Val, it’s awesome.”

The Eagles resisted celebrating on South Ave. Tuesday. They know they haven’t clinched yet, but it will take a minor miracle for them not to be crowned champs after next week.

Chichester has outscored its two remaining Del Val opponents, AP and Penn Wood, by a combined 71-0. Unless the Eagles somehow forget how to throw, catch and hit a baseball, they will be crowned Del Val champs and unseat Interboro once and for all.

“It’s a whole team effort,” said Chichester coach Dan Singley, who praised the job done by his assistant coaches Brian Stumpf, Mike Zurawsky and Jim Donnelly. Stumpf, a former Phillies farmhand, has been vital in the development of the Eagles’ pitching staff. “All the players have bought in and it’s been great this year. It’s been magical and really beautiful this year to see the kids play the way they’ve been playing. We just got to keep it going, you know?”

Chichester should be seeded higher in the District 1 Class 5A tournament, which begins later this month.

As for Tuesday, the Eagles didn’t mess around. They scored twice in the first inning and bounced Interboro starter Tim Convery from the game after the first five batters reached base. Luckily for the Bucs, senior Jared Dellipriscoli stemmed the tide with five strong innings of relief. It wasn’t until he started running out of gas in the fifth inning that the Eagles finally got to him and tacked on two runs to take a 4-1 advantage.

“It gets the energy up,” Boyers said of the Eagles’ two-run first inning. He laced a single to right field to drive home Josh Hankins from third. “We had a lot of energy coming into the game and that first inning kind of skyrocketed it. That’s something, all year, we try to go inning by inning and win each inning. And that gives us all the confidence we need to move on.”

The 2-0 lead in the first inning eased the burden for Taylor, who excelled in the biggest game of his young career. Taylor wasn’t dominant, but he was incredibly ineffective mixing his fastball with a biting curveball that kept the Bucs off-balance. Taylor allowed three hits and two unearned runs while striking out five over six innings to earn the win.

“It took a lot of pressure off of me,” Taylor said. “I’ve been looking forward to this for a long time. Since last year, when I got here, winning the Del Val is something I always wanted to do. … I didn’t have a lot of control today, but my curveball was working when I needed it to.”

Hankins and Colin Jones led off the fifth inning of a 2-1 game with back-to-back singles, the first true threat it managed against Dellipriscoli, who got the Bucs out of a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the first inning and then cruised over the next three innings. Anthony Cericola walked to load the bags and, with one out, catcher Anthony Caramanico knocked in a run with a fielder’s choice. Taylor stepped up next and smacked an RBI single to make it 4-1.

Chichester tacked on six more runs in the sixth and seventh innings off young Interboro relievers Joe Sheriden and Johnny West. In a four-run seventh, Damiana Thompson and Hankins hit back-to-back two-run doubles to make it 10-2.

Boyers logged the final three outs in relief of Taylor, but the Bucs didn’t go down quietly, plating three in the seventh to make things semi-interesting.

Boyers managed to finish the job.

“I just knew I had to take one pitch at a time, stay in the game and don’t get rattled,” Boyers said. “It’s what we’ve done as a team all year.”

Andrew Grieb had a run-scoring double, Dellipriscoli hit a sacrifice fly and Mike Wittorf knocked in a run with an infield single. Boyers came back to strike out two, including Tyler Davis to end the game.

Thompson was 1-for-4 with two runs and two RBIs from the leadoff spot. Hankins finished 2-for-4 with three runs and a pair of ribbies, while Boyers and Taylor each chipped in with RBI knocks. Nine-hole hitter Logan Sullivan singled, scored twice, and stole three bags for the Eagles.

“We’re at the mindset that we can hang with anyone and why not us?” Boyers said. “That’s been our mentality all year. We’ve got Del Val, but there’s still a lot to go. We’re not done.”

In other Del Val League action:

Academy Park 13, Penn Wood 3 >> Barry Brown collected two hits, two RBIs and three runs scored to help the Knights conquer the Patriots in five innings. Hunter Dorman stroked a double and scored four runs for AP (6-5, 6-5).

Christian McHugh pitched four innings of three-hit ball with seven strikeouts to get the win.

Miles Richardson doubled and drove in two runs for the Patriots. Jacquez Mabin added a two-base hit and scored once, while Tovi Mack was 1-for-2 with a walk and an RBI.