Fighting Irish edge Delone Catholic to claim spot

On the same field where they felt their biggest disappointment of the season, York Catholic's baseball players experienced their greatest joy on Thursday afternoon.

The Fighting Irish edged parochial school rival Delone Catholic, 7-6, in a playoff game to determine the Division IV berth for the upcoming York-Adams League Tournament. The two teams had finished the regular season with identical 14-1 division records.

The Fighting Irish will take on Division III winner Bermudian Springs in a semifinal game. It's set for 11 a.m. Saturday at New Oxford High School.

"This is the first time we've won a varsity game at Delone Catholic, football, (boys') basketball, baseball, for the past 10 years," York Catholic's Mark Burnside said. "It's an indescribable feeling."

Burnside played a key role in the outcome by delivering a game-changing hit. In the third inning, with his team trailing 3-2 and two runners on base, the left-handed hitting junior jumped on a first-pitch fastball and drove it over the fence in right field. The three-run shot gave the Fighting Irish a 5-3 lead and put them ahead for good.

"I was in a slump for the last couple of games, and in my second at bat, I looked to drive the ball," Burnside said. "When I hit it, I didn't know where it was. Then I caught a glimpse of it when I was rounding first base and I saw where it was. It was a good feeling to see the ball."

York Catholic pushed across two more runs in the fourth inning to increase its lead to four, but Delone battled back. The Squires scored one run in the fourth and two in the fifth to pull within one run.

At that point, York Catholic head coach Joe Gurreri made a pitching change. Alex Tucci replaced Mike Melhorn, who struck out nine and walked two in his five innings.

"We thought about bringing him (Tucci) in during the fifth inning when Mike started struggling a little bit," Gurreri said. "We had him (Tucci) warm up, but he didn't get enough tosses. The next inning, he was ready to go. Alex and Mike, in some of our big games, have complemented each other. The big lefty (Tucci) vs. the fast righty (Melhorn)."

Tucci retired Delone Catholic one-two-three in the sixth inning, but the Squires' Tommy Fisher led off the seventh inning with his third double of the game, a shot that took one hop and bounced off the fence in right-center field.

Tucci bore down, though, and got the next three hitters, two of them on strikeouts, to end the game. He struck out four and didn't walk anyone in two innings to earn the save.

"My fastball was what was working best for me, and I just pounded the zone with it," Tucci said. "Mike (Melhorn) has been really good all year. We've been best friends a long time (since second grade), and it was nice to save the game for him."

Tucci wasn't just successful on the mound. He also collected three hits (a double and two singles) in four at bats. Burnside and Ethan Urey supplied two hits apiece for the winners. Kodi Reed and Seth Bullers had two hits each for the Squires.

The down-to-the-last-out drama is just what Gurreri, who received the celebratory championship dousing from the water container, expected in the third meeting of the teams this year.

"We played them twice (before Thursday), and both games went down to the wire," the Fighting Irish coach said.

Delone rallied from a 4-0 deficit to win the first meeting, on its home field, 5-4 in nine innings. York Catholic answered back on its diamond with a 7-4 decision in the second contest.

The Fighting Irish erased the memories of the April defeat at Delone with its victory on Thursday. York Catholic captured its first division crown since the 1983 Fighting Irish won the Eastern Division of the York County Interscholastic Athletic Association.

Both York Catholic and Delone Catholic are now 17-2 overall.