ALLENTOWN—State baseball champs back for more

By: Kyle Moylan Sports Editor
    Bravo! Bravo! Encore! Encore!
    After winning the first state championship in the history of the program, the Allentown High School baseball team goes into the 2009 season wondering what’s next.
    “It’s a thrill to go from where we were a couple of years ago (5-17 in 2005 and 9-12 in 2006) to the state championship,” noted Brian Nice, who is entering his fourth season as Allentown’s coach. “The guys are focused now at keeping the program at an elite level. Even though we are young now, we still expect to be competitive.”
    Allentown was probably hit the hardest by graduation on the mound. Ethan Perro was a workhorse, especially during the state title run. Anthony Gambino also has graduated. The same is true of Logan Gallagher, the team’s starting shortstop and closer on the mound.
    “We probably graduated three quarters of our innings on the mound from last year,” Nice said. “We do return Ed Ras and Tom Koontz (both seniors). They’ll be a formidable one-
two on the mound.”
    Ras and Koontz would have pitched more last year, but the top three guys were just so dominating. Going around the diamond, that seems to be the story in a lot of places.
    Don Wood, a senior, will play at first. When they weren’t pitching, either Perro or Gambino filled that spot last year.
    “Most years he would have been the starter,” Nice said. “He’s solid defensively and he can hit the ball.”
    Allentown has a few returnees in the infield, but they are just being shifted around a bit. Josh Howell will shift from third to short. Tom Koontz, a senior, will move from second to third base. Both are very good, dependable players.
    The new player on the infield is Curt Macysyn, a sophomore that transferred from Notre Dame.
    The catcher will be a sophomore, but that could be Mike Ras or Steve Todd. Ras did most of the catching last year.
    “There’s definitely a competition for the job,” Nice said. “That should make both players better.”
    Mark Maiorano, a junior, will shift from left field to center. Maiorano will bat leadoff. Last year he was among the leaders in the Colonial Valley Conference in total hits.
    When he’s not pitching, Ed Ras will play right field.
    The left field spot and the backups will come down to a group of five players — Keith Yatauro (senior), Jeff Hensley (junior), Dan Sandford (junior), Nick Clark (junior) and Brett Miller (sophomore).
    Marc Angelaccio and Tim Magnus are in their fourth years as assistants on the team. Bret Rodgers will be starting his second year.
    Allentown will open the season on April 1 when it hosts West Windsor North in a 4 p.m. start. And despite the loss of several very talented players to graduation, this is a team that expects to still be playing when the state playoffs toll around.
    “This is a young team that is going to get better as the year goes on,” Nice said. “The first five or six games are going to be tough. If we can work through that, we’ll have a good season. We just have to see how quick the young players develop.”
    If it’s as quick — and overwhelming as the last group of guys — that would be great.
    “I had no idea that three years in we would be state champions,” Nice said. “That wasn’t even a thought in the back of my mind. We just wanted to be competitive, but we had so much talent last year.
    “The talent has always been here. The biggest thing was convincing these guys they could win. I don’t know if we have the same talent as last year, but we certainly have a lot of young guys that will win baseball games.”