Brown sparks Hornets

By DENNIS C. WAY
Times Herald Staff

HARLEYSVILLE — Ryan Brown was supposed to be wearing the uniform of the Keene Swampbats Monday night.

Instead, the Souderton High product and Franklin Pierce University catcher was back in the maroon and yellow of Harleysville.

Just in time, as it turned out.

Brown stroked a two-out, pinch-single to right with two outs in the bottom of the 11th inning to lift the Hornets to a 3-2 win over Norristown in a Perkiomen Valley Twilight League marathon Monday evening.

“We’ve been playing seven-inning games in an hour, 20,” said Hornets player/manager Bill McCann said, “and this is one of the longest days of the year. So I guess the planets were aligned perfectly to get 11 innings in.

“I was just talking about how we haven’t had a walk-off win here in years, and now this is our second straight.”

And one that seemed destined to end in a tie, as both sides failed in glorious chances to push an extra-inning run home.

But finally, in the 11th, Hornet John Quigley beat out a one-out infield hit, was wild-pitched to second and moved to third on a ground ball.

The count went to 1-2 on Brown, who didn’t come close to making contact on two offerings from pitcher Matt Sperling. But he laced a no-doubt-about-it liner to right, and the Hornets were, once again, celebrating a win.

“I went up there and I couldn’t see (Sperling’s) slider,” Brown said. “I thought he’d throw me another one. But I got a fastball and took it the other way. I didn’t try to do too much with it.”

By rights, Brown should have been playing in the New England Collegiate Baseball League, where he has been for the past three weeks. With several of the catchers in the league competing in the College World Series, Brown was asked to head north and fill in until they returned.

When some of them returned early, Brown was back in the Perky League, in time to play hero.

But he had company, beginning with Hornets starter Mike Caron, who went the distance, using 153 pitches to complete the job.

“That was just a gutsy effort from Mike,” McCann said. “I guess he was getting in the innings he missed last week (due to rainouts). He was awesome. And he looked as good in the 10th and 11th as he did in the second inning.

“We were kind of short of relief pitching tonight, but I wasn’t going to take this one away from (Caron), anyway.”

The contest looked as though it would end in regulation.

Tony DeLude gave Norristown a lead with a solo homer in the fourth. But Harleysville went in front against Agents’ starter Ben Yoder in the fifth on a walk, an error and RBI singles by McCann and Tom Mahoney.

But in the Norristown seventh, Sean Meister reached on a two-base error, was sacrificed to third and scored on Frank Panzullo’s single to force extras.

Both teams got runners into scoring position in the extra frames. But Caron and Sperling, who came on for Yoder in the eighth, pitching out of trouble.

Until the 11th, when a Swampbat became a Hornet hero.

“This is really an awesome thing,” Brown said. “When I came here, I didn’t know anybody, and they’ve all welcomed me, so it feels good to contribute.

“This isn’t my first hit, I had a couple before I left. But this is probably my first RBI.”

PERKNOTZ: Defensive gem of the game was turned in by Hornets right fielder John Quigley, who laid out to haul in DeLude’s drive to the right-center field gap in the fifth. The grab saved at least two runs. Harleysville pitcher John DelVecchio was unable to make the game Monday because he was living in a car. Apparently, DelVecchio was one of four people chosen by a Philadelphia radio station to live in a Ford Mustang, with the last one to leave the car winning it.

Date: June 22, 2009     Time: 6:00pm      Venue: Harleysville