Octorara is left to carry the load for Ches-Mont

The Chester County baseball scene took a real beating last week in the first and second rounds of district playoff action.

The top seed in Class 6A, Downingtown West was gone after a seven inning fiasco against Council Rock South, while Avon Grove went down to Hatboro-Horsham in a high-scoring affair. The only 6A team still alive is Downingtown East, and the Cougars have to win twice to grab the fifth and final playoff berth.

The Cougars got a great pitching performance from Will Peiffer in the opening round, a 3-1 victory over Quakertown, and had what looked like a commanding 4-0 edge on Pennsbury in the quarterfinals. But the host Falcons roared back to take a 5-4 win and put the Cougars into Tuesday’s tough playback game against Spring-Ford.

The Class 5A bracket was even worse for Chester County teams as both West Chester Henderson and West Chester East failed to hit the ball at all in opening round shutout losses. Unionville did win a first round game, defeating a lowly Chichester club, before MarpleNetown embarrassed the Indians, 13-1. West Chester Rustin won its first round game over Bishop Shanahan behind Chris McMahon, but came up small in an upset loss to Upper Merion.

In Class 2A action, Devon Prep lost in the title game to Dock Mennoninte 2-0 and the Tide failed to repeat as district champions. With Malvern Prep not winning the Inter-Academic title courstesy of two tough 1-0 losses to Penn Charter, most of the area really came up small in the baseball department.

The shining star, albeit an unusual and unexpected one, are the pesky Octorara Braves in the Class 4A bracket. The Braves put together a very nice season in the Ches-Mont American Division and were no longer an easy game for the other Ches-Mont League teams.

Now, the Braves will try to win the District 1 Class 4A crown against New Hope Solebury in a game where the Braves will be favored. Last week’s rainouts work in Octorara’s favor as star pitcher Aaron Feld will now be on the hill for the Braves, something that would not have happened if the game had been played on Thursday as originally planned.

The Braves are a real nice story. Coach Jed King used Feld in the games he thought he could win to ensure that his club was not one of the two District 1 Class 4A teams left out of the playoff bracket. Catcher Tim Lubrano is one of the better battery mates around and outside of Rustin’s McMahon, Feld takes a backseat to no one when he is on the hill.

So, it is up to Downingtown East and Octorara to save some face for the beleaguered Ches-Mont League, and it really does not seem so long ago that the league was the best in District 1.

Apparently, not anymore.

Peter DiGiovanni covers high school baseball for Digital First Media and PaPrepLive.com. You can reach him at pdigiovanni07@gmail. com. Follow him on Twitter @PeteDLN.