By: centraljersey.com
Perone Landscaping Softball out of Montgomery Township won the massive 66-team Trentonian Class E-D flight softball tournament recently.
Perone went a perfect 7-0 in the tournament raising it’s tournament record to 15-2 over the summer. Earlier this summer, Perone won the Brick Bash for Cash and recently took third place at the Hooter’s Bounty for the County Tourney.
Perone Landscaping consisted of a team of veterans from Conte’s 40-and-over team and some past outstanding Montgomery High School baseball players. John Engelmann, Sean Faust, Steve Perone Jr., Matt Pizzolato, Kevin Harris and Sean Mahoney all played outstanding softball, with the infield of Faust, Engelmann, Perone turning countless double plays in the tournament run. Several of Perone’s players are still playing hardball in college or in collegiate summer baseball leagues.
"I have coached and watched these kids play since they were 10 years old and always said one day we were going to make a pretty good softball team," said Steve Perone Sr. "These kids made this softball thing look easy and I could not be happier with a tournament championship like the Trentonian. It only took about 25 years!"
Perone Landscaping Softball opened the tournament with a 19-18 win over a Caddy Shack team from Plainsboro in eight innings. Perone jumped out to a 12-1 lead early, but could not hold the lead and had to win it in extra innings.
Game 2 was a defensive battle as Perone won that game, 3-2. Game 3 was the big game of the day as Perone played a very good young team in Weingart Construction. This battle of Montgomery was close all the way with Perone’s winning, 11-7.
"These kids from both teams are friends and also teammates," Perone said. "Both teams played their heart out and this was the game we knew we had to get in order to win this tournament."
From there Perone beat Sadano’s, JVS of Medford, and The Post Office from Philadelphia in the winners’ bracket final. The final game had Perone coming from two runs down in the final inning to defeat The Warriors from Jackson. Magnus Padalla’s single to right scored Jon Brost from second and the party was on. Brost broke his shoulder in the process.
The veterans came up big also as Ken Paster hit over .700 and won the MVP award. Mike Burla, Joe Plumeri, Bob Fleming, Jon Brost, Paul McKenna, Gregg Boyden and Steve Perone Sr. all helped out on the way to the championship.
"We had a great mix of old and young," Perone said. "Along the way we seemed to gain more fan support and it really helped in the end.
"Our motto going into this tourney was ‘In it to win it.’ Last year we won our first five games and then ran out of gas. This year, we knew we had to get more athletic. It has been a long time coming for Perone Landscaping Softball. The best finish was fourth place and last year we went 5-2 and were fifth place."
Top Hitters for tournament: Paster .730, Matt Pizzolato .650, Jon Engelmann .630, Steve Perone Jr. and Mike Burla .600, and Sean Faust .550.

