Jul. 21—Ryan Kelly was hoping for one more win and a chance to play baseball with his West Lawn Owls teammates for another week.
It almost happened.
The Owls led Norchester by a run in the fourth inning before they ran out of experienced arms and saw the Berks League champion Bulldogs pull away for a 5-2 victory Tuesday afternoon in the Legion baseball Region 2 Tournament championship game at Owls Field.
“We’ve played these guys five or six times this year,” said Kelly, who went the distance in a 4-3 win over Wyomissing earlier in the day to put the Owls in the title game. “We know a lot of their weaknesses. We tried to get ’em, but just didn’t come out on top this time.”
The host Owls (26-10) certainly had their chances. They got a strong starting effort from Nick Crocona and led 1-0 in the fourth after Domenic Borelli doubled and scored on Ryan Graff’s two-out single.
Just like earlier in the tournament, when West Lawn led Norchester (23-12-2) 1-0 after five, the Owls couldn’t hold on. Their pitchers walked eight over the fourth and fifth innings and the patient Bulldogs took advantage to build a 5-1 lead.
“I thought we played well the whole tournament,” said West Lawn coach Scott Spatz. “Today, we just didn’t get a couple hits early that could’ve broken the game up. We had a lot of opportunities. You go into that fourth inning with a four- or five-run lead vs. a one-run lead, it could change the momentum.”
Norchester right fielder Sam Morris stole the momentum with a game-changing play in the second inning.
The Owls had runners on the corners when Borelli lofted a fly ball to medium right. Morris caught the ball, then fired a seed to home plate to nail Ryan Sekulski to prevent the Owls from taking the lead.
“That was huge for them,” Kelly said. “At that point Nick (Crocona) was doing a great job (pitching); they had no baserunners. That’s what got their momentum going.”
The Owls put four runners on base in the second inning but came away without a run. They had Norchester starter Jared Berish, who walked five, backed to the wall several times but couldn’t deliver the decisive hit.
The Bulldogs took the lead with a pair of runs in the fourth, both pushed home on bases-loaded walks.