Souderton’s defense too much for Pennridge
On a hot and humid Thursday night at Kulp Park, the Souderton American Legion baseball team’s defense maintained a 6-0 shutout victory over hometown Pennridge.
Both teams had trouble at the plate in the first two innings only getting one hit in seven at-bats.
Souderton eventually got the board in the top of the third inning with three runs.
Nolan Bolton drove in the first run by getting hit by a pitch from Pennridge’s Jon Nase. After Moses Clemens drove in the second run on a sacrifice fly, Jacob Horton made the game 3-0 with an RBI single to left field.
Souderton made it 6-0 in the top of the fifth inning when two runs scored on a two-run double from Clemens and a sacrifice fly from Horton.
Pennridge had an opportunity to score in the bottom of the fifth inning when Jack Goddess crushed a leadoff double. However, Goddess was tagged out at second base after Jacob Davis struck out looking for a bizarre double play.
Both teams couldn’t find any scoring opportunities in the last two innings, thus giving Souderton the 6-0 road victory.
Aaron Groller earned the win for Souderton on the mound by throwing 4 2/3 scoreless innings while striking out seven batters and giving up only two hits.
“I feel pretty good about this game,” said Groller. “The goal was to actually get the shutout today and that’s what we did.”
Horton, who went 2-for-3 with two RBIs at the plate, also had a good pitching performance tossing two scoreless innings in relief.
“Our team has been playing really good lately,” Horton said. “I haven’t pitched a lot lately so it feels good to get back into the zone on the mound.”
Most of Souderton’s players won the PIAA Class 6A championship for the Souderton High School team this past season, which Horton thinks is a big confidence boost for the Legion season.
“After winning the states in high school, our goal now is to go farther than where we ended last year,” Horton said. “We got to regionals last year and we are hoping to get to the world series this year.”
Goddess highlighted the Pennridge offense
going 2-for-3 with two doubles in the loss.
Pennridge head coach Cory Landes, despite getting shutout, was pleased with the way his team performed
against a tough Souderton squad.
“We were a little short on how many guys we had today,” Landes said. “We missed a couple of key guys in the lineup,
but we have full faith in these guys.”
“We could have easily been blown out against Souderton with who we had,” added Landes. “But the guys held in
there with them and I’m thrilled for that.”
Pennridge looks to bounce back on Saturday when it travels to Perkiomen for a doubleheader, the first game scheduled to begin at 1 p.m. Souderton looks for its sixth straight win on Friday when it travels to Lansdale with first pitch scheduled for 6 p.m.