Fort offense breaks out behind Campbell
UPPER DUBLIN >> The idea of pitching a must-win elimination game had Jackson Campbell pretty fired up.
Things didn’t start out as planned, but once his bats backed him up, Campbell found his groove and ensured Fort Washington would live another day in the Lower Montco Legion playoffs. The Generals face a tall task in edging Roslyn twice, but Saturday was all about earning that chance.
“I love being in that situation,” Campbell said. “It’s an awesome situation to be in and makes you want to go out and get it done.”
Fort Washington jumped out early and Campbell closed strong in 7-4 win over Mt. Airy at Upper Dublin High School.
“I just had to stay tough mentally, think about throwing
strikes and letting my players and bats do their thing to make plays,” Campbell, a rising senior at Springfield Township, said. “That really helped me out. If I gave up one or two it wasn’t a big deal, I just had to let my guys do what they had to do.”
Mt. Airy, the third seed and second seed Fort Washington met in the doubleelimination tournament’s opening round with the Generals rallying after a first half-inning deficit. Saturday, they found themselves in the same position.
Elias Meredith led off with a double to center field and three batters late, Avi Cantor crushed a tworun double to deep center field putting the Stars up 2-0. Campbell left Cantor at second and closed out the inning without damage and his offense was ready to erupt.
A night after being held in check by Roslyn, the Generals had three of their first four batters reach base and used an RBI single by Brian McPeak and runs on a passed ball and wild pitch to go ahead 3-2.
“It’s funny, both times we played them they went up 2-0, we came back and scored and kind of took the momentum,” Fort Washington manager Gary Bonitatibus said. “It was huge today and huge the other day when we played them. We hit some balls hard, some of them were tough plays but if you put the ball in play, good things can happen.”
Mt. Airy starter Colin Brown battled, but he was done in by a couple fielding mishaps in both the first and second innings. Two errors helped Fort load the bases to open the second inning, with Kevin Keown’s ensuing single plating a run.
McPeak brought in a run
on a fielder’s choice then Ethan Hamilton delivered the big hit of the earlyinning rally with a tworun double to right center. Hamilton, also a rising senior at Springfield Township, said he knew he wouldn’t get much to hit off Brown, so he pounced on a fastball that got stuck up in the zone.
“It felt really good, I think it gives us a lot of confidence for (Sunday) and we’re going to be coming in hot,” Hamilton said. “We were trying to hit the ball hard and make them make plays. That’s how we won the game.”
Fort Washington’s defense was pretty sound all game save for a couple miscues in the fourth inning that opened a window for Mt. Airy. An infield error brought home a run and kept the inning going, which allowed Owen Woodward to plate a second run on an RBI double, both with two outs.
Campbell buckled down and got out of the inning without any further damage. From there, the righthander cruised to the finish by retiring the final nine batters in order over the last three innings.
“I had to bear down and let them make the plays out there,” Campbell said. “I was looking to keep (Mt. Airy) off balance. Our defense is really good so I wanted to let them do what they do.”
Fort Washington will clash with Roslyn at 4 p.m. Sunday at Mason’s Mill Park with the LML title on the line. If Roslyn wins, the Blue Hawks book the league’s spot in the Region 3 tournament while a Fort Washington win would set up a winner-take-all contest on Monday.
“This win does a lot for us,” Hamilton said. “We can take what we did today into tomorrow and get after it with the same attitude and the same mindset.”