Souderton edges North Penn in 8 on Lepore’s walk-off single

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FRANCONIA >> Jess Lepore knew what was coming. And the sophomore shortstop knew the Souderton softball team had done too much to let Tuesday afternoon’s game slip away.

So with two on and two out and the Indians tied 5-5 with visiting North Penn in the bottom of the eighth inning, Lepore took the first pitch she saw from NP’s Rachel Lowry and ripped it through the left side of the infield for the walk-off win as Souderton countered the Knights’ late comeback and earned the 6-5 victory.

“She’d been consistently throwing down the middle of the plate first pitch and I just knew this pitch is going to come right down the middle,” Lepore said. “I had a runner on second base, I just put it together in my mind somehow that we were going to stick through the end of that.”

North Penn trailed 4-1 after five innings but scored a run in the sixth then plated three with two outs in the top of the seventh to take a 5-4 lead.

Souderton, however, forced extras with its own two-out rally in the seventh — Alex Scheeler doubling to left then scoring on Ali Gould’s RBI single. And in the eighth, Big Red came up clutch again on Lepore’s two-out RBI single to sweep the regular-season series over the Knights.

“I thought that they thought they had it,” Lepore said. “They definitely had that cockiness that they thought they had this game and our team, we don’t ever get too cocky or we don’t ever just lose it in the last inning or the last few innings. We just stuck through and they didn’t do the same thing.

“We just overpowered them in the last inning. We just the little extra oomph that they didn’t have.”

All nine hitters in the Souderton lineup recorded a hit. Gould was 2-for-3 with two RBIs, Julia Kistler went 2-for-3 while Lepore, Alina Skrzat and Bri Neely all finished 2-for-4 — Lepore chipping in a pair of RBIs.

“That’s softball. You really never know,” Indians coach Liz Parkins said. “North Penn fought — we both fought all game. And honestly, you couldn’t ask for a better softball game. We have had issues with giving up those late runs in the sixth and seventh innings but being on our home field, again, just all of our hitters, they all stepped up today. I think everybody had a hit and I’m just so proud of this team for not giving up.”

Jamie Beer was 3-for-4 with an RBI, Jordan Pietrzykoski was 2-for-4 with an RBI and two runs scored while Elia Namey was 2-for-4 with an RBI for North Penn (14-4, 7-3), which had its nine-game winning streak snapped.

“It was a good game. We just didn’t come out early and put some runners on base,” North Penn coach Rick Torresani said. “And at they end they came back. That’s a heck of a comeback with two outs. And they came back with two outs and scored a run to tie it and got to hand it to Souderton, they came ready to play.”

The loss also puts the Knights a game behind first-place Central Bucks South in the SOL Continental standings with both teams having two conference games remaining, the first being North Penn hosting South 3:45 p.m. Thursday.

“They played their A game today and we didn’t play our A game,” Torresani said. “And that’s just the way softball is. Hopefully we’ll see them in the districts if that’s what it comes down to. We’ll be ready.”

Scheeler earned the complete-game victory for the Indians The Moravian commit gave up five runs — all earned — on 10 hits, one walk and one hit batter.

“I thought she did really well, again, really well, she was hitting her spots,” said Parkins of Scheeler said. “Some pitches might have been a little too good, but no, overall she threw a really good softball game.”

Lowry took the loss after coming in for NP starting pitcher Mady Volpe in the sixth. Lowry allowed two runs — both earned — on five hits in 2 2/3 innings. She walked one and struck out two.

Souderton, which is now 13th in the District 1-6A power rankings — North Penn is sixth with the top 20 making the field — steps out of conference play to host Boyertown 3:45 p.m. Friday.

“This last week in a half going into districts, we got to focus on the little things, take everything one pitch at a time, one game at a time, not get too far ahead of ourselves,” Parkins said. “I think that sometimes that’s what happened in the past couple week is we look past games where we need to be in the moment and focus on the task at hand.

After North Penn went down in order in the top of the eighth, Skrzat led off the Souderton half of the frame with a single but was forced out at second base as the Knights tried to turn a double play on Megan Hamilton’s grounder — Hamilton was safe at first.

Hamilton went to second on Kistler’s sacrifice bunt. With first base open, North Penn opted to intentionally walk Indians leadoff hitter Neely. That brought up Lepore and her first-pitch single scored Hamilton from second as the throw home went too long.

“It was pretty close to the shortstop so I wasn’t sure if she was going to make an amazing play,” Lepore said. “But as soon as that ball got through there and their left fielder, whoever fielded that ball, threw it in, I just knew that ball was going to sail over the catcher’s head and we were going to win.”

North Penn cut the Indians’ lead to 4-2 in the top of the sixth. After Beer’s double off the fence in left put runners on second and third, Courtney Neal pulled NP to within two with her RBI single to left.

In the seventh, Namey’s two-out double off the fence in center scored Victoria Juckniewitz from first to make it 4-3. On the next at-bat, Jordan Pietrzykoski’s single to right brought home Namey to tie the game. Pietrzykoski took second on the play, then scored to put North Penn ahead 5-4 when Beer dropped an RBI single into right.

“Elia, Jamie, they did step up and they got the bigs hits. Two of them hit the top of the fence,” Torresani said. “But you got to hand it to Souderton. When things were down they came through.”

Lowry retired the first two Souderton batters in the bottom of the seventh but Scheeler kept the Indians alive by dropped a double into left. Gould followed with an opposite field single to right, plating Scheeler to knot the contest 5-5.

“Alex if she gives it up she gets it right back. She’s that great of a player that she can take it in her own hands and she did that today,” Parkins said. “Nobody was going down without a fight.”

Souderton took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first on a Gould double. North Penn responded to make it 1-1 in the top of the second on Neal’s RBI sacrifice fly.

The Indians went back up by scoring three runs in the fourth. Hamilton broke the tie with an RBI double to left. Neely’s bases-loaded RBI infield single put Big Red up two. With the bases still loaded, Lepore hit an RBI sacrifice fly extending the lead to 4-1.

“Mady Volpe, she’s a great pitcher, she has a good rise ball and that hurt us last time — we struck out 10 times against her,” Parkins said. “So we had the mind set of just going up and attacking early and I think that’s what happened in the fourth inning and we jumped on those first-pitch strikes and were able to manufacture some runs from it.”

Mike Cabrey

Mike Cabrey
Mike Cabrey is the Assistant Sports Editor for The Reporter and Montgomery News. Email him at mcabrey@thereporteronline.com.

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