Greater Pittston finished second of nine teams and the Wyoming Valley American Legion Senior Baseball League is hosting a four-team playoff to determine the league’s second representative in the Pennsylvania Region 5 Tournament.
Strong pitching carried Greater Pittston to the finish at 12-4, handing Swoyersville its first loss along the way.
Swoyersville went 13-2 and earned the league’s automatic berth in the Region 5 Tournament, which will be played at Mountain Post and Greater Pittston, July 15-16, before being played strictly at Greater Pittston’s field in Hughestown July 17-19.
Plains (7-8) landed the last playoff berth and was scheduled to play Greater Pittston in Saturday’s league playoff opener. Stars & Stripes from Hazleton (9-7) and Nanticoke (11-5) were playing in the second game.
The two losers and two winners meet in Sunday games. The elimination bracket final is Monday at 5:30. The title could be decided Tuesday at 5:30, or, if the last two teams have one loss each, a final game will be played Wednesday at the same time.
A recap of the final week of the season when Greater Pittston won five straight before dropping its finale:
Tunkhannock 6
Greater Pittston 5
Tunkhannock won Thursday in what Greater Pittston manager Jerry Ranieli called “the dilemma game.”
Greater Pittston could have gone all out with pitching and other decisions for the long shot of finishing tied for first in the standings if it got help from a Swoyersville lost.
By league rules, the team would have still started a four-team playoff Saturday because a tie for first place would have eliminated the automatic regional qualifier and knocked the fifth-place team out of playoff consideration.
Greater Pittston 11
Back Mountain 2
Cory Lescavage and Tyler Jackson had three hits each.
Kyle Ralston added two hits for Greater Pittston, which used four pitchers in Wednesday’s home-field win over a Back Mountain team that was still trying to fight its way into the playoffs.
“We were just trying to save arms for the playoffs,” Ranieli said.
Greater Pittston 13
Wilkes-Barre 1
Tyler Jackson threw a five-inning, three-hitter with 12 strikeouts in Monday’s romp.
Jackson, Kyle Ralston and Dylan Melberger had two hits each.
Greater Pittston 3
Swoyersville 0
Josh Kopcza kept up his strong late-season pitching, throwing his second straight, one-hit shutout July 2.
Kopcza struck out six while handing the defending state champions their first loss.
After coming within two outs of a perfect game against Back Mountain in his previous start, Kopcza had 22 strikeouts while allowing just two hits in his last two outings.
Steve Homza, who finished with three hits, including a double, singled in two of the runs in a three-run second inning.
Greater Pittston 6-13
Stripes & Strikes 0-5
Hunter Ralston finished off the combined shutout in the resumption of a suspended game, then cousin, Kyle Ralston, got the complete game win while going 3-for-3 in the full game that followed.
Cory Lescavage homered and singled in the completed game.
Tyler Jackson had two hits and three RBI while Matt Wright was 2-for-2 with two RBI in the second game.
Plains
Plains split its final four games, all on the road, to claim the last playoff spot.
After beating Mountain Post, 5-2, June 30; Plains lost at Tunkhannock, 4-3, the next day; went to Hazleton to beat Stripes & Strikes, 11-1, Monday; and lost to league champion Swoyersville, 9-1, Thursday.
Chase Nowak and Taylor Chronowski threw complete games in the wins.
