King, Blue Streaks win 14th in a row on game bookended by offense at Ephrata, 5-1

Taking their 13-0 record on the road to Ephrata on Monday evening, the Blue Streaks were looking to finish off a Section II sweep against the Mountaineers on their own turf (literally).

Kyle Musser and Drew Sassaman came prepared at the plate in the top of the 1st. A leadoff single from Musser and quick triple to right field from Sassaman made it 1-0 Township only moments into the game. A full count single from Colin Fitzgerald plated Sassaman and gave Township’s starter, Dylan King, a 2-0 lead as he took the mound in Ephrata’s half of the 1st.

Coming off a win at E-Town last Tuesday, King (5.2 IP, 1 R, 3 H, 7 K) pounded the strike zone on 90 mph fastballs with ease in the 1st. Allowing only one baserunner, King retired the Mountaineers on a ground out and back-to-back strikeouts to hold the 2-0 lead. Both teams generated two baserunners in the 2nd, but the score remained unchanged.

After quiet 3rd and 4th innings, Ephrata capitalized on back-to-back full count walks from King in the 5th. The Mounts cut the Township lead in half, 2-1, with a single to right to score one before a tag out at the plate during the next AB and tag out at 3rd on a thwarted steal attempt ended the half inning. 

King was replaced on the mound by Evan Clark with 2 outs in the bottom of the 6th after reaching his 100-pitch limit on his 24th batter faced. Clark proceeded to need only 5 pitches to strike out the next batter and send Township into the 7th with their 2-1 lead intact.

With 1 out in the top of the 7th, Michael Heckman beat out an infield grounder to give the Blue Streaks some offensive life. Musser and Sassaman collected consecutive walks to load the bases on Ephrata’s relief pitcher before Fitzgerald dropped a single into shallow right field and extended Township’s lead back to two, 3-1. Clark helped himself out with a SAC fly to the right fielder to allow Musser to tag up and score prior to an Ephrata fielding error on a Ryan Jones ground ball that sent Sassaman home safely. Thanks to the three insurance runs, Clark carried a 5-1 lead back to the mound to pitch the final half inning.

Ephrata nabbed two walks in the 7th, but two more Clark strikeouts and an unassisted groundout to Fisher Druck at 1st base sealed the Blue Streaks’ victory. Now 14-0 on the season and clear of any other Section II opponents, Township returns to Westfield Insurance Park on Wednesday evening to host J.P. McCaskey in their second meeting of the season.