Souderton rolls past Lansdale
LANSDALE >> Derek Moyer provided the biggest blow in Souderton’s big inning Monday night.
With bases loaded and Post 234 already up 6-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth inning in its BuxMont American Legion matchup with Lansdale, Moyer belted a pitch into the gap in right center field, clearing the bases to extend the lead to nine.
“Went down early swinging, head was flying out of the place and kind of just buckled in,” Moyer said. “Realized it was happening and put it to right field.”
Souderton tacked on two more runs to finish with a nine-spot as it batted around in the frame, pulling away after scoring its opening two runs in the first — the offense more than enough for Dave Gulibon, the left-hander tossing a one-hit shutout in an 11-0 five-inning win over the Cannoneers at Weaver Field at Memo
rial Park.
“I don’t know if you know his brother (Brett), Moyers can hit — they can hit,” Souderton coach Paul Meara said. “And he probably doesn’t get enough chances but there’s so many kids on this team, it’s really hard.”
Jordan Morales reached on all four of hits plate appearances going 2-for-2 with a double, two walks, an RBI and a run scored while Moses Clemens finished 2-for-2 with two RBIs as Souderton (14-2) won its fourth straight, stay just behind first-place Quakertown in the race for the Bux-Mont’s regularseason title and the Region 2 berth that comes with it.
“We got thrown out at the plate in the first two innings, they could have been big innings but we were kind of weren’t not so smart in the first couple innings so we recovered. We had the one big inning which is good.
“Last night we got done quick and tonight, any time you don’t use pitching it’s life saving.”
Gulibon’s stellar effort on the mound provided a needed night off for the rest of Post 234’s arm with the squad trying to finish out regular-season schedule condensed in part due to Souderton Area High School’s winning the PIAA Class 6A championship.
“It’s really tough, these last two weeks we played 15 games in a row, whatever, it was just tough on everybody,” Gulibon said. “Definitely showed during (the doubleheader loss to) Quakertown, we were all beat.”
The lone hit for Lansdale (6-11) — which began its doubleheader Monday with a 1-0 loss to Perkiomen — against Gulibon came in the top of the second when William Egner’s single through the right side of the infield put two runners with two outs. Gulibon, however, got the next batter to fly out to right.
“We wanted to keep all the pitchers within 45 pitches or less just to get ready for the playoffs,” Cannoneers coach Larry Pijanowski said. “Obviously we played very well against a (Perkiomen) team, we just didn’t make the plays against Souderton. We gave them way too many runs. They’re a really good team, but we just gave them too many runs early.”
Gulibon found a groove in the third and fourth innings, collecting five straight strikeouts. The streak was ended with a two-out walk in the fourth but the lefty proceeded to strike out the next batter.
Gulibon, who attends the University of South Carolina, finished with nine strikeouts, three walks and one hit batter in the shutout win.
“It felt pretty good,” Gulibon said. “All I did is just put it there and throw strikes. That was my mentality for the night.”
Moyer, who graduated from Souderton this spring, didn’t get a lot of playing time during the high school season but enjoyed the experience of being a part of the Indians’ first state title.
“School year was fun,” he said. “Playing wasn’t really that big of a deal to me, I realized there was kids better than me on the team and players play. It was a great time to be there and happy we’re playing.”
Souderton is back in action 6 p.m. Tuesday hosting Nor-Gwyn at Romanoski Field then visits Doylestown Wednesday.
Clemens gave Post 234 a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first as he bases-loaded single down the third base line scored Morales and Lucas Shank.
After Souderton began the bottom of the fourth with a groundout, its next eight batters all reached base, Souderton sending a total of 13 to the plate in the nine-run inning.
Post 234 loaded the bases after Billy Norbeck was hit by a pitch and back-to-back walks to Morales and Shank. Norbeck scored as Conlan Wall dropped an RBI single into shallow center. Clemens ripped an RBI single through the left side to make it 4-0 while Gulibon singled up the middle to bring in both Shank and Wall.
A Joe Santone walked loaded the bases for Moyer, who put Souderton up 9-0 with his three-RBI double. Two batters later, Norbeck made it 10-0 with an RBI single while Morales followed with an RBI double to right center.