S-CT wins after rain delay

MILLERSBURG - What a difference a year makes.

Last year, Shamokin-Coal Township's 12-year-old all-stars lost their first game in the District 24 Tournament by a score of 32-2.

This year, the 12-year-olds not only won their first game, but did it with a no-hitter, downing Millersburg, 2-1 on Tuesday behind the pitching of Levi Long, with some relief help from Chase Tillett.

Shamokin-Coal Township didn't exactly light up the scoreboard, picking up only two hits of its own, but managed to manufacture a couple of runs and play errorless ball on defense.

The game started at 5:30 p.m., but was halted in the second inning thanks to an hour-long rain delay, in which it rained for 30 minutes and another 30 minutes were needed to get the field again ready for play.

Long worked right up until the final two batters, when he had to quit pitching because he had reached his 85-pitch limit. He struck out 10 batters and walked four, and was really only in trouble in the first inning, when he walked leadoff hitter Rob Burger, then unleashed two wild pitches allowing Burger to score. Millersburg never had more than one runner on base in any inning afterward, and Long retired 10 of the final 11 batters he faced, seven on strikeouts.

"Levi took care of most of them for us," said Shamokin-Coal Township Manager Jim Campbell. "When we had to play defense, we did a good job. But we're going to have to work on being more aggressive with the bat. We fell behind in the count too often."

Shamokin-Coal Township tied the game in the bottom of the first inning. Thomas Campbell walked, took second on a wild pitch and scored on a passed ball.

But Millersburg pitcher Ethan Troutman worked out of some jams as well. Shamokin-Coal Township left two men on base in the second inning and bases loaded in the third inning, but a baserunning mistake ended the second inning and Troutman got a strikeout to end the third.

But Burger, the second pitcher, wasn't as lucky in the fourth. In fact, he was totally unlucky. Pitching with two outs and a runner on, he gave up a single to Josiah Miller, but appeared to get out of the inning when he got Tillett to bounce back to him. He calmly threw to first for what appeared to be the third out. The teams were already starting to change sides when the Shamokin-Coal Township bench yelled for Miller to get back to third base.

Bench coach Scott Dunn had noticed that the first base umpire never called Tillett out, and the umpire ruled that the Millersburg first baseman had never touched the bag on the play, which allowed Campbell, who had been on third, to score.

Burger led off Millersburg's sixth inning by walking for the third time, but Long struck out Zaire Reid and Troutman before having to give way to Tillett.

Tillett walked Christian Keiter but then got Austin Lehman to bounce back to him for the final out.

Only Miller and Noah Rachau are left from the 12-year-old all-stars of last season, according to Campbell.

"The 11-year-old team was competitive last year," Campbell said. "They were only 1-3 but they were competitive, so we expected to be better."

Shamokin-Coal Township hosts Orwigsburg on Friday at Ferndale at 5:30.

Game Summary

Sign up for Text Alerts

Sign up for e-mail newsletters