Liberty’s Pitsilos is a baseball lifer
Head coach provided a steady hand at wheel of ride to state final
Andy Pitsilos looks good in Liberty High’s creme-colored, pinstriped baseball uniforms.
Then again, Pitsilos looks good in any baseball uniform because it seems as though it’s what he’s always wearing.
Pitsilos is a baseball lifer. At age 52, he still plays for one of the area’s senior leagues, and still plays well. Truth is if he had to choose between playing and coaching, he’d probably play.
Fortunately, Pitsilos can do both and, as long as he’s around the game that has been a part of his life from the day he was born, he’s happy.
Pitsilos has been the Hurricanes head coach for 20 seasons. In 2022, his team became the story of local baseball with a remarkable run to the PIAA Class 6A title game at Penn State.
While Liberty came up short against Warwick in the finals, the program continues to be one of the most consistently successful in local scholastic baseball — 2022 will not likely be the last season
Hurricanes players will want to remember.
In becoming The Morning Call’s coach of the year, Pitsilos provided a firm, steady hand for a talented, but inexperienced group that grew more comfortable as the games got bigger.
After a disappointing 1-0 loss to Nazareth in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference semifinals, Liberty went back to basics. The team didn’t look back, but rather forward, following Pitsilos’ “next pitch” mantra.
The result was a memorable six-game win streak that carried the Hurricanes to their third District 11 championship since 2017 and three state playoff wins.
Pitsilos saw early on that he had to bring the team together. An 8-3 loss to Nazareth in cold weather March 29 featured six errors and some disharmony.
“The players were getting on
each other and this is one of the first times I was with all of them and after the game we sat them all down in the outfield,” Pitsilos said. “It was cold that day, but I told them this won’t happen again. If we win or lose, we will be on each other’s side. In retrospect, that loss brought us together and we made some other adjustments. Around the sixth or seventh game, we looked and saw we had 61 strikeouts as a team and we said that also can’t happen anymore. We needed to change our swings with two strikes. And then over the next 13 games we had just 47 strikeouts. We stopped striking out.”
While the pitching was stellar and the defense improved, the Hurricanes used small ball to win games.
“It was a learning process and in previous years that learning comes with losses, but this year we just happened to keep eking out wins,” Pitsilos said. “Most of the games were close and we kept winning. That’s a testament to the toughness of the kids.”
It was also a testament to the culture Pitsilos has built.
Liberty baseball teams play with the confidence and the swagger that Hurricanes football coach Shawn Daignault and boys basketball coach Nigel Long would love their kids to play with.
Pitsilos is not a yeller and a screamer, but when he does raise his voice the players listen.
“That’s not Andy’s style,” longtime
assistant Mark Benetsky said. “That’s my job.”
Assistant coach Evan Dwyer, who played for Pitsilos along with fellow assistants Alex Specht and Tommy Vazquez, said it’s interesting to be the other side and work with Pitsilos instead of playing for him.
“He has been coaching for so long; everything comes so naturally to him,” Dwyer said. “He delegates things to his assistants and lets us coach while always keeping an eye on everything.”
Pitsilos relies on all of his assistants, but his greatest resource has been his father, George, a Blue Mountain League Hall of Famer and someone who has been associated with Bethlehem baseball for more than 50 years.
George Pitsilos played for Liberty High coaching legend Bernie Fritz and also was an assistant
coach for many years with Harry Dudeck, who was the last Hurricanes leader to take the program to the state finals. Dudeck did it in his last year, 2002.
Just as baseball is in Andy Pitsilos’ blood it also pulsates through the community with strong youth programs. While baseball’s popularity may be waning on a national level, it’s vibrant in Bethlehem and Pitsilos never has to worry about being able to field a team or have a bunch of kids that must be taught the game.
“The parents are great and bring these kids up the right way,” he said. “Then you have my freshman coach Charlie Raineri and JV coaches Jack Rusnak and Stan Sterner and my assistants Evan Dwyer, Tommy Vazquez and Alex Specht who were my players. It’s a group effort. It’s an honor to have those guys want to coach with me and then you have my dad and Coach Benetsky, everyone is so much of a help, especially my dad who coached me growing up and taught me so much.”
With Liberty baseball, people get involved and stay involved.
“You have Glenn Dwyer, who has not kids playing, but remains the president of the booster club,” Pitsilos said. “It’s dedication like that which allows us to keep feeding the program year after year and and continue the tradition. Over here, there’s no going backward. You just add on. It’s an all-year program with the different things we do. We give kids an opportunity to succeed through what we do here. And then it’s up to them. The kids we have work hard. The kids need to buy in and each year they make the rules along with the coaches because we want them to have buy-in. We hold them to a pretty high standard. The kids change, but the expectations don’t. Hopefully, future teams will get to experience what this team experienced.”
Pitsilos also said he’s thankful to have the support of Principal Harrison Bailey III and athletic director Fred Harris, a former Freedom coach.
But he’s most thankful for his wife, Heidi, who makes sure everything goes smoothly at home while Pitsilos tries to bring home championships.
“She’s the business handler,” he said. “She takes care of everything at home. We have three girls, ages 14, 13 and 10, and two dogs, and the girls have a lot of activities and do stuff with friends like girls their age do. During the season, there’s no time for to decompress. You’re always thinking about the next game, the next challenge and while I try not to show it to the kids, you have a lot of emotions inside of you. I don’t how long I will keep doing this, but I know I couldn’t do it without her.”
PAST COACHES OF THE YEAR
2021: Jeremy Haas, Emmaus
2019: Mike Bedics, Notre Dame-GP 2018: Nick D’Amico, Freedom
2017: Josh Hinkle, Wilson
2016: Mike Svetik, Palmerton
2015: Rob Leskosky, Allen
2014: Mike Bedics, Notre Dame-GP 2013: Tom Nuneviller, Pennridge 2012: Jon Lock, Nazareth
2011: Mike Pochron, Salisbury 2010: Brian Polaha, Lehighton 2009: Tony Galucy, Parkland 2008: Tony Galucy, Parkland
2007: Mike Grasso, Bethlehem Catholic
2006: Todd Miller, Southern Lehigh 2005: Chick Kennedy, Palisades 2004:, Mike Pochron, Salisbury 2003: Tony Galucy, Parkland
2002: Harry Dudeck, Liberty
2001: Mike Grasso, Bethlehem Catholic
2000: John Schreiner, Emmaus 1999: Fred Harris, Freedom
1998: Mike Grasso, Bethlehem Catholic
1997: Scott Brosky, Catasauqua 1996: Harry Dudeck, Liberty
1995: Gene Jani, Allen
1994: Mike Schneider, Northampton
1993: Tony Ciavarella, Easton
1992: Dan Waelchli, Parkland
1991: Harry Dudeck, Liberty