Pennsylvania

American Legion Baseball

The first round of the playoffs in the league is best of three.  Three of the four series have been decided so far, with the next round commencing Thursday evening.

The results are as follows:

(1) Northampton defeated (8) Roseto two games to none (7-6, 12-8)

(2) Nazareth defeated (7) Kemp two games to none (8-5, 8-4)

(6) Freemansburg upset (3) Wanderers two games to none (5-4, 5-4)

(4) Wind Gap beat (5) Bath 8-7 in game one, with Bath winning game two 18-6.  A deciding game was scheduled for Wednesday evening.

Semifinal matchups will be:

(1) Northampton vs. (4)Wind Gap/(5) Bath

(2) Nazareth vs. (6) Freemansburg

We'll post updates as soon as we have them for this league, and all others across the state.

The Lehigh Valley League in PA's Region 2 began their annual double-elimination postseason tournament this evening.

The results are as follows:

(1) North Parkland 11, (8) Lower Macungie 1

(2) South Parkland 13, (7) Fullerton 0

(6) Northern Valley 16, (3) Salisbury 7

(4) Lehighton 7, (5) Coplay 1

Please note that the league does not utilize predetermined brackets.  Re-seeding is done to ensure that the top seed places the lowest remaining team left, and so on.

Thursday's games will be:

Winner's Bracket

(1) North Parkland vs. (6) Northern Valley

(2) South Parkland vs. (4) Lehighton

Loser's Bracket

(3) Salisbury vs. (8) Lower Macungie

(5) Coplay vs. (7) Fullerton

Cambria County's four best of three quarterfinal playoff series began on Monday.  Somerset defeated Patton 12-2, Claysburg topped Westmont 10-6, Bedford beat St. Michael 12-2, and Portage beat Ebensburg 9-5.

Stay tuned for updates on these playoffs, as well as results from around the state.

A full page dedicated to all the playoff contests in Region 2 is now available at the top of the drop-down menu under the main Region 2 link.  Simply scroll over Region 2 at the top of the page and click the desired link from the drop-down.

This page has up to date information for the postseason in each of Region 2's five leagues, including schedules, seedings, and results.  We'll be updating the page frequently to reflect the newest information we have, so check back often!

We're hoping to add similar pages for the rest of the regions, though we could use your help gathering information.  Like information on the regular season, information on the postseason tournaments seems to be rather scarce in some of the more rural parts of the state.  If you have any information that you could send our way to help us out, please don't hesitate to comment on this post, send me a private message, or email us at [email protected]

Thanks!

The District 31 League in PA's Region 7 has begun its playoffs.  The top eight teams began best of three series the other day, with some somewhat surprising results so far.

On July 3rd:

(8) Bushy Run 6, (1) Hempfield East 5  (Bushy Run leads 1-0)

(4) Murraysville 9, (5) Irwin 3  (Murraysville leads 1-0)

(6) Greensburg 18, (3) Kiski Valley 7  (Greensburg leads 1-0)

(2) Latrobe 15, (7) West Hempfield 3  (Latrobe leads 1-0)

July 4th:

(8) Bushy Run 15, (1) Hempfield East 8  (Bushy run wins series 2-0)

(5) Irwin 7, (4) Murraysville 5  (series tied 1-1)

(3) Kiski Valley 6, (6) Greensburg 3  (series tied 1-1)

(7) West Hempfield 11, (2) Latrobe 8  (series tied 1-1)

The remaining games were played last night, we'll update you as soon as we get the results.

Be sure to check back later!

The District 11 League of northeastern PA's Region 5 has finalized their representatives for the upcoming state regional tournament.  The two teams are determined by the regular season champion in each of the league's two divisions.

By virtue of a 10-3 record in the Kay Division, Dunmore has advanced to state play.  Valley View gets the league's other bid, after winning the Sebastianelli Division, with a record of 9-4.  Both divisions were hotly contested, with South Scranton and Carbondale/Lakeland just missing out on the top seeds.

The District 11 League has one of the most unique postseason formats in the state, as they'll continue playing games through the next several weeks, sans the two division winners.  The remaining teams aren't eligible for state postseason play, but do get many more weeks of games in the area.  This format allows for every team to keep playing a while longer, whereas with a tournament scenario most of the teams would be done for the summer in early July.

In other Region 5 news, the Wyoming Valley League's playoff picture will become much clearer on Thursday night.  The final teams and seedings will be determined then, with the tournament commencing on Saturday.

Be sure to check back often for up to date playoff results from around the state!

The eight teams of southeastern PA's Berks County League begin their respective playoff games on Wednesday evening.  Tournament is double elimination, nine inning games.

Games are hosted by the higher seed for the first two days, before heading over to Bear Stadium for the remainder of the tournament.  

First round games are as follows:

Exeter (8 seed) at Boyertown (1), 7pm

West Lawn (5) at Shillington (4), 7pm

Gregg Post (7) at Conrad Weiser (2), 5pm

Daniel Boone (6) at Twin Valley (3), 7pm

Since West Lawn is hosting the PA Region 2 Tournament in a few weeks, only the postseason champion (or runner-up if West Lawn wins) will advance to state regional play.

The Northampton County League kicked off their playoffs last night in Region 2 with four first round matchups that were all closely contested games.  Each matchup was the first in a best of three series between the teams. 

The results are as follows:

Wind Gap defeated Bath 8 to 7  (Wind Gap leads 1-0)

Northampton defeated Roseto 7 to 6 (Northampton leads 1-0)

Freemansburg beat the Wanderers 5 to 4 (Freemansburg leads 1-0)

Nazareth beat Kemp 8 to 5 (Nazareth leads 1-0)

The Schuylkill-Berks League has completed its regular season and set the matchups for the league-wide playoffs.  There will be separate playoff tournaments for the North and South Divisions, with the division winners meeting in the championship game for the right to move on to the state regional tournament.  The first round is slated for Tuesday and the matchups are listed below.

North Division

Schuylkill Valley Falcons at Southern Area – 5:30

Northern Schuylkill at Pottsville – 7:00

Minersville at Pine Grove – 7:00

Valley View at Tamaqua – 5:30

South Division

Bethel at Kutztown – 7:00

Hamburg at Fleetwood – 5:30

Schuylkill Valley at Oley Valley – 5:30

Wyomissing at Muhlenberg – 6:30

More details are available at the Schuylkill-Berks League website.

Here is the playoff preview for the Elk County League courtesy of site member Elk County Fan1:

Playoffs start in full force next week with Fox taking on Bradford and St. Mary's facing the winner of the Smethport/Kane vs Ridgway game in the best of three series. Both series should be very interesting as Fox Twp and Ridgway have been playing some great baseball as of late. Fox after a 1-4 start to the season has rattled off nine wins in their final 10 games. They enter the playoffs as the hottest team in the league and disposed of Ridgway 10-0 in six innings this past week. Ridgway on the other hand has beaten Bradford two out of three games and has battled St. Mary's on even terms dispite losing two of three games to the St. Mary's squad. St. Mary's has been steady all season long as expected. Bradford has shown signs of a team slowly slipping away. They finished the season with three straight losses to Ridgway, Smethport and St. Mary's. Although they have beaten Fox three times in the regular season they just don't look like the team of the past couple of years. St. Mary's is no doubt the favorite to win the Elk County League with a very deep and talented roster. Bradford is the reigning two year champion and they won't go down easily, but keep your eye on Fox Twp and Ridgway. It wouldn't come as a shock to those close to this league if these two end up in the finals. Best of luck to all teams!

The playoff picture in Region Two has begun to come into focus.  North Parkland has clinched a spot in the regional tournament at West Lawn by virtue of its Lehigh Valley League regular season championship.  The Buffaloes won the title by defeating rival South Parkland 9-5 on Saturday night.  North Parkland will participate in the league's playoffs as the number one seed.  If North Parkland wins the league tournament, then the league runner up will claim the league's second regional berth.  Final pairings have yet to been set.

For more info, visit the Lehigh Valley League's site:  http://www.eteamz.com/lvlegion/

Regular season play has finished in Philadelphia, and the playoff schedule is set.  The six playoff qualifiers are Ivy Ridge, Bustleton, Olney, Loudenslager, Del Val, and Chestnut Hill.  As division winners, Ivy Ridge and Bustleton have been given a bye to the semifinals.  Chestnut Hill will play Olney in one first round matchup, while Del Val faces Loudenslager in the other.  These games are scheduled for Tuesday, July 6th.  The survivors of these single-elimination matchups will face the division winners in Best-of-Three series beginning on Wednesday.  A Best-of-Three championship series will follow, with the winner advancing to the Region Three Tournament later in the month.

For more information about the Philadelphia County playoffs, check out the league's website:  www.leaguelineup.com/welcome.asp?cmenuid=1&url=philalegion&sid=206936678

Things have gotten a little hectic, but we promise a bunch of standing updates are coming tonight!  Be sure to check out the league pages for the most up to date information we have.

If you can help us get some of the standings that are outdated, please send a message to [email protected]!

We wanted to pass along the story about the untimely death of a member of New Jersey's legendary legion family from Brooklawn, the Barths.� For decades the family has shaped young individuals in South Jersey and have been a part of one of the most storied franchises in all of the United States.� The Barth family is almost solely responsible for Brooklawn's historic rise to fame over the past decades, including a great deal of success on the national level.

Yesterday, Father's Day no less, the Barth family lost one of its sons, Bob, in a tragic car accident.�

Please head to http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/20100621_Member_of_SJ_baseball_dynasty_killed_in_car_accident.html for more information.

We'd like to send our condolences to our New Jersey brethren on this great, and unexpected, loss to their family.

We'd like to wish a Happy Father's Day to all of you dads out there! 

We took in the always highly anticipated match-up between the Boyertown Bears and West Lawn Owls of PA Region 2's Berks County League.  The rivalry generally features some highlight reel plays and a hostile environment.  Tonight's game was no different.

West Lawn jumped out to an early one run lead when their leadoff hitter began the game with a walk and came around to score on a base hit off of Boyertown southpaw Colby Hartman.  After Boyertown tied it up on a sacrificed fly, the Owls went ahead again 2-1.  The Bears struck back, though in a controversial manner, when they attempted a double steal with runners at first and third and one out.  The runner was thrown out at second, but the runner who broke from third just beat the tag, much to the dismay of the visiting fans.

Following an error, Boyertown rallied for one of their prototypical big innings which consisted of seven runs on only a few hits.  The Bears were aided in the game by five costly West Lawn errors and several hit batters and walks.  One of the most interesting points in the game came when Bears leadoff hitter Ryan Schwager was hit not once, or twice, but three times in the same at bat.  The first two were ruled balls because Schwager didn't attempt to get out of the way.  The pitcher hit him again a third time for good measure.

The Bears continued to manufacture runs off of the Owls pitching staff throughout the game.  With one out in the eighth, Boyertown had runners at first and second base up seven.  Andrew Gehringer ripped a towering homerun to left field to deliver three more runs and end the game via the ten run mercy rule.

With the way this series always goes, and the fact that West Lawn will host PA Region 2 Tournament and the Mid-Atlantic National Regional, and Boyertown hosts the Berks County and PA State Tournament, these teams are sure to meet at least a few more times on not so neutral grounds.

Final score: Boyertown 14, West Lawn 3 in 8 innings

Though information on PA Region 5 is hard to come by, the site is lucky to have a contributor from the area.  Nate, from Plymouth, has supplied us with a plethora of scores from many of the leagues in the region.  We thank him for his help and ask that if you think you could be of assistance to us to please send me a message or an email.

Thanks again for stopping by!

Hatfield and Nor-Gwyn are separated by just a few short miles, and the rivalry has developed into one of the most intense around in recent years.  Hatfield took the regular season Bux-Mont title last year before Nor-Gwyn stormed back to take the co-championship with Boyertown while Hatfield's season ended early.

This year, both teams were quick out of the gate, Nor-Gwyn undefeated and Hatfield near the top of the standings in the league.  Tonight's game was a thriller... though it didn't appear that's how it would turn out from the onset.  Nor-Gwyn jumped out as well as they could have possibly hoped, to say the least, with eleven runs in the top of the first inning.  

But no lead in legion baseball is ever safe.  Hatfield rallied back for ten runs of their own throughout the course of the game, and had the tying run ninty feet away when the Hawks iced the game with a strikeout.  Nor-Gwyn stayed undefeated in league play with this victory.

Final Score: Nor-Gwyn 11, Hatfield 10

The season is still in its early stages, but New Oxford couldn't be happier with the way they have jumped out of the gate.  The team from Region 4's York County is already 4-0 in league play, with several shutouts to their credit.  

Over the past several weeks, New Oxford has defeated Stewartstown 7-1, Dover 7-0, and Pleasureville 2-0.

Region 4 and York County appear to be wide open races this year, so New Oxford has certainly positioned themselves well to make a run at the league and region championships.

Philadelphia's legion teams haven't enjoyed a great deal of success in the recent past, but are certainly poised to create a name for themselves in the area this year.  The Olney Redbirds and the league's perennial power, Ivy Ridge Panthers, are both undefeated so far in Region 3's Philadelphia County League.

Olney is 3-0 and atop their division while Ivy Ridge is 2-0 and in first place in theirs.  Ivy Ridge has done pretty well in recent years but hasn't always had the opportunity to play in the postseason for one reason or another.  NorChester has had a strangle-hold on Region 3 for a while, so whatever team ends up making it out of Philadelphia will surely have a tough route to the State Tournament in Boyertown later this summer.