Titans rally, walk off against Fort Washington
Nothing was going to stop Charlie Wetzel once he left third base.
The Hatfield-Towamencin infielder had worked his way around the bases with one out in the bottom of the seventh Monday night and he was determined to get home. Nick DiPippo gave him the opportunity, lofting a ball to center field and sending Wetzel on the tag.
The throw in was good, but a bounce gave Wetzel the space to cross home for the winning run as Hatfield-Towamencin walked off a 4-3 win over Fort Washington in their BuxMont Connie Mack game at School Road Park.
“I knew I was going once he hit it, I saw the catch, ran in and we won,” Wetzel said. “I was going straight home and if anybody blocked me, I was going right through them.”
Monday’s win capped off a nice rally for the Titans, who trailed 3-1 going into the bottom of the sixth. After plating two runs in the sixth to knot the score, they kept momentum on their side to set up and execute the winning play for a quality win a week out from the league playoffs.
While the result didn’t mean much in the overall standings, with Hatfield-Towamencin all but locked into the No. 2 seed and Fort Washington still on the outside of the bracket at No. 9, it did make up for a couple rough games for the Titans last week. Outfielder Jack Picozzi felt Monday’s effort was just what the Titans needed.
“It’s a team game, we all came together and everybody did something to contribute,” Picozzi said. “We did a great job on the base paths, had some timely hitting, great defense, great pitching and we came together at the right time with some fire in the dugout and put out a great team effort.”
Picozzi had a good night off Fort ace Griffin Pestrack, crushing an RBI double that scored Aidan Copstick on the first and hitting a sac fly that scored Copstick to tie the game in the sixth. Copstick went 3-for-3 at the plate while Wetzel had two hits and a walk to pace the H-T offense.
Although the Commodores haven’t chalked up a lot of wins this summer, they’ve battled in every game the same way they did Monday. Pestrack, who threw a complete game, is a rising junior at Upper Dublin and the team’s oldest player with every other player either going into their sophomore or freshman year of high school.
“Most of my guys are 14 or 15 and most of the guys in the league are 16 or 17,” Fort manager Tyler DeGiacomo said. “At the beginning of the year, I was talking with our Generals coach in Legion, Gary Bonitatibus and Lou Lombardo, our general manager about maybe playing in the ‘B’ league with more teams our age level, but a lot of these guys have Legion aspirations and they had their spring season taken away so we wanted to give them this chance.”
Fort Washington has solid players and they came together in the fourth inning under the lights at School Road Park. Aidan McCarty led off with a single with Evan Bunting following with a one-out hit to put two men on.
A hit batsman sent Matt Lagowski to load the bags ahead of Brodie Wedholm, who answered in turn with a well-struck single to leftcenter that plated a pair of runs and put the Commodores in front. Bunting stretched the lead to 3-1 in the sixth after he walked, stole second and third and scored on a throwing error.
Down but far from out, the Titans looked to rally.
“Their pitcher was throwing strikes the whole game but we felt seeing it a couple times, we could start to hit it,” Wetzel said. “We have to play this well in the playoffs and if we do, we’ll go far.”
Quinn Marrett started the rally when he was hit by a pitch with one out. Copstick singled, and Marrett’s aggressive baserunning paid off when the Fort defense had to scramble, leaving home plate uncovered. An errant throw helped and Marrett was able to outrun the recovering catcher down the line while Copstick came around to third base.
Justin Egner walked, then Picozzi dug in knowing he only needed to put the ball in play to tie the game.
“It’s about knowing the situation and who’s on base,” Picozzi said. “I got a pitch to hit and we did what we needed to do, all that mattered was we got the run.”
Aiden Hoy pitched five strong innings for Hatfield-Towamencin before Zach Riddle took over. With the score level, Riddle kept Fort Washington off the board in the seventh to help set up the finale.
Wetzel led off the home part of the frame and took the first pitch he saw to left for a single. His only goal was to score and the infielder made that a reality by just beating the throw in to second on a stolen base, then moving up to third before Hoy grounded out.
DiPippo worked a 2-2 count before launching a ball to center. Austin Pendleton, who covered a lot of ground all game, made the catch and put in a good throw, but it clipped the front of the mound and took a hard bounce that denied the Commodores a play at home as Wetzel crossed the plate for the win.
“All we needed was one, so I just wanted to get that run in,” Wetzel said.
“That’s a great morale boost coming off a few tough games,” Picozzi said. “It’s a big thing for a team and it should get some momentum going for us into the playoffs.”