HAZLE TWP. — Hazleton Area’s baseball team was on the verge of simultaneously accomplishing two things on Saturday: opening its season with a bang and exorcising its North Penn demon.
The Knights had other ideas.
North Penn (3-0) erased a 7-1 deficit with six unearned runs in the top of the sixth inning, before eventually scoring the winning run on Mason Coyne’s RBI double in the eighth in an 8-7 non-league victory at Pasco Schiavo Field.
“We kept plugging away. …Fortunately, our late-inning bullpen guys gave us a chance,” said Knights head coach Kevin Manero, whose District 1 power has beaten Hazleton Area five times since 2021, including twice in the opening round of the PIAA Class 6A tournament and three more times at the start of recent seasons.”
The Cougars were poised to end that hex, Saturday, after first-inning home runs by Nick Ledger and Dom Marino off North Penn ace Trevor Lugara staked them to a 3-0 lead.
Then, after the Knights got one run back in the top of the fifth, Hazleton Area answered with four in the bottom half highlighted by Shea Higgins’ booming two-run double.
And even after North Penn charged back to tie the game, the Cougars had base runners on in the home sixth, seventh and eighth innings, but Knights relievers Trey Brennan and Caleb Price kept Hazleton Area off the scoreboard the rest of the way.
“Nothing,” Cougars head coach Russ Canzler said, when asked what he’d take positive away from his team’s 2025 opener. “We gave up a six-run lead with our good arms in the game. Whatever positive things we did in the game are eradicated by giving up a six-run lead. That just can’t happen.”
“Hats off to North Penn,” he added. “They just never quit. They’re a well-coached team (and) a great program. Our guys got to learn how to close those games out.”
After Marino, the first of three Hazleton Area pitchers, worked out of a jam in the top of the first, the Cougars quickly went to work against Lugara in their initial at-bat.
Logan Hearity worked a leadoff walk and took second on Ryan Racho’s bunt. On the next pitch, Ledger drove a towering fly ball to right field that carried over the fence for a two-run homer. Five pitches later, Marino blasted a solo shot to left-center to pad his team’s lead to 3-0.
The Cougars also had their leadoff batters reach in both the second and fourth innings, but Lugara picked off runners at second to squelch both rally bids.
Meanwhile, Marino retired the Knights in order in the second and escaped a no-outs, first-and second jam in the third, freezing Coyne on a breaking ball for a called third strike to end the top of the third.
The first of Hazleton Area’s two double plays on the afternoon helped Marino wiggle out of trouble in the fourth, before he gave way to Freddie Corrado.
North Penn finally broke through in the fifth when Chase Jones tripled to center and came home on Logan Waynick’s sacrifice fly.
In the home fifth, Bryant Diaz led off with a double and stole third. Hearity walked for the second time ahead of Racho’s perfectly placed bunt single that plated Diaz for a 4-1 Cougars’ lead. After Nick Ledger bounced into a fielder’s choice, Marino was safe on an error, bringing in Hearity. Higgins followed with his two-run double for a seemingly safe 7-1 lead.
But in the North Penn sixth, a walk to Christian Barnes, Ben Grattan’s double and another walk to Matthew Pownall loaded the bases with one out. Still another walk to pinch hitter Kyle Bonner forced in run, setting the stage for the game’s most pivotal play: an error on a possible double play ball that made it 7-3 and kept the sacks packed with Knights.
Jack Esposito, the third Cougars’ pitcher, induced a forceout at home for the second out, but Josh Martinell poked an RBI single, a hit batsman with the bases loaded and Kevin Brace’s two-run single that went off two Hazleton Area gloves into right suddenly tied the game at 7.
“Making simple mistakes like catching the baseball, throwing away some at-bats, getting behind batters, those kinds of things (cost) us,” Canzler said. “We stress to our guys to play with urgency and alertness. I just feel when we got that six-run lead, we let our guard down.
“I want to be clear that the loss is on me and I take full responsibility for the outcome,” he continued. “We failed in preparing to compete for seven innings.”
Despite both teams having chances to win before the contest went to extra innings, neither did.
In the eighth, Waynick led off with an infield single, went to third on a groundout and scored easily on Coyne’s double.
The Cougars put up a fight in the bottom of the inning on singles by Hearity and Ledger wrapped around a Racho lineout, but Hearity was stranded at third when the game ended.
“We were tenacious today,” Manero said. “It was a good character win, but, that being said, there are a lot of things we need to clean up. That’s why we play good teams early in the season.”
Hazleton Area next will be in action at Bethlehem Liberty on Saturday, March 29.
North Penn (3-0) 000 016 01 — 8 10 2
Hazleton Area (0-1) 300 040 00 — 7 8 1
Lugara, Kelley (5), Brennan (5), Price (8) and Jones; Marino, Corrado (4), Esposito (6) and Ledger.
W — Brennan. L — Esposito.
