Hopewell’s repeat bid ends in semis
EWING » Never give up and never be satisfied.
Those are two important ideals manager Mike Coryell instilled in his Hopewell Post 339 baseball players over the last four summers.
It is part of the reason Post 339 has been in the New Jersey American Legion Final 8 the last three years. It is part of the reason Hopewell won states last summer and advanced all the way to the American Legion World Series.
It is also why Coryell’s charges were upset Thursday when they fell to Whitehouse Post 284, 6-4, in the semifinals of the 2018 State Final 8 at Fred Walters Field in Frank Moody Park.
Whitehouse (30-5) will advance to Friday’s 4 p.m. state final against the winner of last night’s Washington Township Post 521-Broad Street Park Post 313 game.
Post 339’s season ended after a 27-9 campaign.
“I think it’s a tribute to the program that, to a man, the players weren’t satisfied with losing this game,” Coryell said. “Whitehouse played well, but our players did not give up.”
Coryell would not have expected any less as Hopewell took on Post 284’s 6-foot-3 right-handed pitcher Tyler Diefenbach, a Phillipsburg High graduate who is headed to Montclair State University.
Even though manager Steve Farsiou’s team jumped to a 4-0 lead as Post 339 committed an uncharacteristic three errors in the first two WHITEHOUSE
abrhbi JJohnsn ss 4221 Koep 2b 4111 Cosntno 1b 3 1 2 1 Longo c 3 0 1 1 Sible cf 3 0 0 0 Mason rf 3 0 1 1 Wagner 3b 4 1 2 0 Wickmn dh 3 1 2 0 Totten lf 3 0 0 0 Totals 30 6 11 5
Whitehouse(30-5) Hopewell (27-9)
HOPEWELL
abrhbi Blair c 4000 Tobia rf 3111 Psomrs 3b 3 0 0 0 Brodine 1b 3 0 0 0 Blake ss 3221 Hare lf 2100 Bartltt dh 3010 Iorio cf 3001 Taglrni 2b 3000 Totals 27 4 4 3
2201100—6 0112000—4
E — Koep 2, Psomaras, Blake 2; LOB — Whitehouse 9, Hopewell 2; 2B — Koep, Longo, Wagner, JJohnson, Mason; HR — Cosentino, Blake, Tobia; SF — Mason; SAC — Totten, Wickman; SB — Cosentino; CS — JJohnson.
IP H WHITEHOUSE POST 284 Diefenbach W 7.0 4 HOPEWELL POST 339
St. John L,6-1 4.0 7 5 2 3 1 Bregenzer 3.0 4 1 1 0 3 innings, leading to three unearned runs, the Mercer County League champs began chipping away at Diefenbach when Andy Blake sent a 1-1 pitch over the left field fence in the bottom of the second.
“He threw well,” Blake said of Diefenbach, “but I was seeing the ball well. Down, 4-0, I knew we had to do something. In the end, we couldn’t do enough.”
Blake went 2-for-3 with two runs scored and one run batted in. That accounted for half of Hopewell’s output versus Diefenbach. Jeff Bartlett’s single later in the second inning was one, and Jake Tobia’s solo home run in the third was the other.
“I knew coming in that they were going to be tough, so I had to pound the zone and throw strikes,” Diefenbach said. “When I missed, they hit it.”
After Post 284’s Pete Cosentino homered off Post 339 starting pitcher Tony St. John in the top of the fourth, Blake’s R ER BBSO 4 2 1 5 one-out single and Cole Hare’s walk led to a pair of unearned runs in the bottom of the frame to close the gap to 5-4.
Little did anyone know at that point, that Hopewell would only manage one more base runner (when Nick Psomaras reached on an error in the fifth) over the final three innings.
“I’ve been taught that pitchers have to have the shortest memory on earth, so I did not worry,” Diefenbach said.
Instead, Diefenbach retired the final seven batters he faced in order with the help of a leaping snag by first baseman Cosentino on a sharply hit ball by Kenny Tagliareni in the bottom of the seventh.
Even with three-time state finalist Zack Bregenzer coming on to limit Whitehouse to one run over the final three innings, it could not get Post 339 back to the state championship game, leaving the Hopewell players unsatisfied.