By Justin Feil, The Packet Group
The Hillsborough Senior American Legion baseball team could have lived with getting beaten by the older teams it was up against in the District 2 playoffs.
It was harder to take being eliminated for one of the two spots to advance to the state Final Eight on a technicality.
”Getting knocked out that way, I can’t take getting knocked out on a forfeit,” said Hillsborough head coach Drew Campbell. “We were playing well. We came out the first inning and hit it well. We hit it hard. I thought we’d come around like the first game. We were playing good defense.”
Hillsborough had a 2-1 lead over Little Ferry, looked good at the plate and had their ace pitcher on the mound, when the Little Ferry manager found the minutia in the rule book that states that Legion teams must start games with 12 players. Hillsborough only had 11, which certainly was no advantage.
”They called the Legion commissioner and the Legion commissioner said we had to forfeit,” Campbell said. “It also says that the commissioner can overrule it, but he didn’t. We had 11 guys at the game before that. It was not a classy move at all.”
The forfeit loss was the second of the tournament for Hillsborough. Mt. Morris sent Hillsborough into the losers’ bracket with an 18-8 setback last Friday. They won their opening game, 6-3, in 10 innings over Glen Rock Post 145 last Wednesday.
”The first game is the most important and we won the first game,” Campbell said. “Our first game, they probably played the best game they had all year. They played 10 innings. They didn’t have any errors. They got all the bunts down and had six or seven stolen bases. It was a well-played game for our guys.”
Hillsborough used Brady Caudle and Matt Hornich on the mound, and they allowed just one walk all game. The defense was good behind them to hold Glen Rock to three runs. In the 10th inning, Hillsborough broke through for the win.
Andrew Zitel’s one-out single got things started. Zitel stole second and scored on Nico Mukendi’s single. After a pair of walks, Elmer Chang got down a suicide squeeze for another run. Hornich followed with a brilliant 14-pitch at bat in which he worked a bases-loaded walk to force in another insurance run.
”Every team we played was all seniors and freshmen in college,” Campbell said. “I told the team before we played, we had to do all the small things right and play good defense in order to win the games. The first game, we bunted about six times, and stole about seven bases. They out-hit us, but we got the clutch hits at the right time.”
Mt. Morris came out swinging the bats well in the next game, and Hillsborough was quickly in a deep hole. Hillsborough tried to rally late, but it wasn’t enough in the 10-run loss.
”The team we played, they just opened up an early 6- or 7-0 lead,” Campbell said. “They hit the ball well. I gave our kids credit. We battled back to score about seven at the end of the game. They were a very, very good team.”
Hillsborough was off to a promising start Saturday when they had the rule book thrown at them. Had they won Saturday, they would have gone into Sunday needing a pair of wins to make the state Final Eight. South Brunswick Post 401 joined winner Flemington Post 159, of which half the team is Hillsborough High School graduates, in advancing.
”I had my two pitchers coming back for Sunday,” Campbell said. “I talked to the Flemington coach and he thought it would have been close, but we could have advanced to the Final Eight if we didn’t forfeit. Other teams were out of pitching.
”I had our two guys from Wednesday coming back. All you need to do is take a lead. They were carrying us very well.”
Hillsborough finished the summer with 10 wins in 22 games, including the forfeit loss. The entire roster is eligible to return to play Senior Legion. They will be making up a large portion of the HHS varsity team next spring, and this summer helped prepare them.
”Going into the state tournament, it gives them the experience,” Campbell said. “It’s not a higher level of play than they’ll see. A lot of the kids (in the tournament) are already playing college baseball.”
Despite the way they were forced to exit the tournament, Campbell felt his team got a lot out of qualifying for it.
”It was definitely a good experience,” he said. “Talking to the players afterward, they were excited they went in the tournament. After we won that first game, they realized they belonged and knew they could stick with anyone in the tournament. Flemington, which won it, we only lost by one in the regular season.”
They were able to contend with anyone in the regular season, something that bodes well for the spring season. Many of the Hillsborough Senior Legion players will move into fall ball at Diamond Nation. They will unite with some of the juniors that didn’t play on the Hillsborough Legion squad to give an even better picture of what the Raiders varsity will look like next spring. For those that played on the Senior Legion team this summer, there’s already plenty to look forward to after competing so well with more experienced teams.
”I would say we have a lot of potential,” Campbell said. “The players from Hillsborough play with a lot of heart and emotion. That also takes you far in baseball. The kids we’re playing might not go as hard. Our kids go 100 percent all the time. We always pride ourselves on not making the mental mistakes that other teams might make.”
Those are qualities that no rule book can take away from the members of the Hillsborough Senior Legion that played so well all summer.
