Published: July 24, 2008 11:15 pm            

Westmont relishing its first trip to regionals

Westmont has only been in the Cambria County American Legion league for four years.

The franchise gets its first taste of regional competition, traveling to Saturday’s Region 7 tournament at the Shaner Complex near State College to take on Westmoreland League winner Kiski Valley in a 4:30 p.m. contest.

“The kids are real excited,” Westmont manager Dave Price said. “This franchise has never had the experience of playing in the regionals before so they don’t know quite what to expect. We have four Bishop McCort kids on the team and they had some experience in the high school playoffs with being under pressure. Having that experience is always important because it makes you more confident and you react better.”

Westmont played its way into the regionals with a 2-0 sweep over Lilly in the Cambria County League first-round playoffs. Westmont then battled Claysburg in the semifinals, taking that best-of-3 series 2-1 before sweeping top-seeded St. Michael 2-0 in the championship round.

In the seven playoff games, Westmont won road games four times.

“Being on the road hasn’t bothered us so far, although this will be a little different on Saturday,” Price said.

Kiski Valley won its best-of-3 series with Latrobe, 2-0.

“We just found out Tuesday that we’re playing Kiski,” Price said. “We don’t really know much about them. They have a couple nice players.

“You focus on your strengths like you have all year. You can’t play to their weaknesses if you don’t know what they are. We like to swing the bat and run the bases and see what they’re like after a couple innings.”

Price said that a decision about a starting pitcher and lineup has not yet been made, but has a strong roster of players from which to choose.

Outfielders include Brennan Becker, Mike Kastelic, Dave McKolosky, Eric Lowry and Alex Pozun. Sean McDonald is expected to get the start at catcher while the infielders will be Matt Ziance, Seth Matthews, Zak Boyd, T.J. Keklak, Andy Godish, Matt McDaniel or Corey Adams.

“We want to make sure we get everyone in the game,” Price said. “We want to have a good lineup and feel confident that whoever is in the lineup will be focused and relaxed. Our strength is our hitting in positions 1 through 9. We are capable of hitting the ball hard and have speed on the basepaths.

“I think we have enough athletes and competitors that want to take that next step and see what they can do at this level,” Price continued. “I think they’ll react pretty well. We’ve played Somerset and St. Michael in the playoffs and we’ve seen the level of success that they’ve had in the regionals and that they were pretty competitive. I think our players will be ready.”

        

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