HIGH SCHOOL SOFTBALL

P-O captures league crown

By Ron Bracken

PHILIPSBURG — Tuesday was a back-to-work day for the Philipsburg-Osceola softball team.

Gone was the raucous dugout from the day before, gone was the huge crowd, gone was the tension that always accompanies a game against archrival Bald Eagle Area.

Which doesn’t mean the Lady Mounties weren’t focused as they met Central Mountain in a game that would determine the Mountain League champion. They were and they showed it early with a pair of three-run innings that launched them to an 8-0 victory over the Lady Wildcats.

So now they don’t have to share the Mountain League crown with anyone. It’s all theirs for the wearing, thanks to a two-hit, 15-strikeout performance by Chelsea Rex and a three-RBI day from catcher Taylor Harpster.

“Business-like,” is how Mountie coach Jim Gonder described his team’s performance. “Chelsea pitched a really nice game. She was never in trouble. From beginning to end, she was in control. And we had some timely hitting.”

“One of the goals the girls set for themselves was to win the Mountain League and they’ve accomplished that,” he added. “That’s a big deal for them. I was concerned about a letdown (after Monday’s emotional win over BEA) but these kids have played a lot of games and it’s a credit to them that they didn’t let that happen. They came out and took care of business.” Immediately.

Kelsey Gonder led off the bottom of the first with a walk and took second on Morgan Coble’s single. Both runners moved up on a wild pitch by Taylor Lesser before Harpster dropped a single just inside the left field line to score both runners.

After a walk to Katie Confer, Central Mountain coach Dave Peters replaced Taylor Lesser with Brittany Kunes. A fielder’s choice set the table for Mackenzie Wilson’s single to right which scored Confer. Wilson was thrown out at second on the play to end the inning.

P-O was right back at it in the second as Amber Hockenberry doubled to dead center, Kelci Knepp walked and Kelsey Gonder lined an opposite-field double to left to score Hockenberry and move pinch runner Katie Carpin to third. Harpster drove her in with a sacrifice fly to left and Confer’s single scored Gonder to make it 6-0.

Harpster, who was among the most vocal of Lady Mounties on Monday, said they weren’t about to let down with a league title on the line.

“We wanted the league title to ourselves,” she said. “We didn’t want to have to share it with anyone. We came out today wanting to win. We play in a really tough league with Bald Eagle, Bellefonte, Penns Valley and Central Mountain so to come out with a 19-1 record is pretty good for us.”

The Lady Mounties added solo runs in the third on an RBI single by Hockenberry and in the fifth on Rex’s homer to left.

Rex, who yielded only an infield single to Heidi Shoemaker in the fourth and a double to left by Tierra Miller in the seventh, struck out at least one batter in every inning and had three strikeouts in the first, fifth and seventh. She now has struck out 27 of the last 40 batters she’s faced and has 119 in 601/ 3 innings.

“In the last few games she has mixed her pitches and hit her spots,” said Harpster. “She’s throwing well. It’s less work for me because you don’t have many runners on base so you don’t need to worry about them advancing. She’s determined to pitch good and she has pitched good. Central Mountain is a good hitting team and you could see them sort of getting down on themselves.”

Harpster and Hockenberry, who hits seventh, each had a single and a double in P-O’s 10-hit attack.

“When you get production throughout the lineup it makes it tough to pitch to us,” Jim Gonder said.

The top-seeded Lady Mounties will be idle until Monday when they meet the winner of Thursday’s District 6 AA playoff game between Cambria Heights and Marion Center at P-O at 4 p.m.