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Monday, March 31, 2025

March 28-31

Back at the Arena on Friday evening for the start of another weekend endurance test, the Maine Mariners were in town for another three-in-three weekend (Maine broadcaster Michael Keeley has coined a phrase for these, he refers to them as "threekends"). This was the last of three such weekends on the home schedule, the Royals also had six of them on the road. On Friday the visitors from the Pine Tree State scored first but it would be the only one they would get. Matt Miller pulled the Royals even in the second period and put them ahead in the third, empty-netters from Jake Smith and defensemen Logan Britt cemented a 4-1 victory. On Saturday the trend continued with Maine getting on the board first, Sam Sedley tied it 1-1 at the intermission. Two answered scores for the Mariners gave them a 3-1 lead entering the third, with five minutes left Mason Primeau lit the lamp making it 3-2. In the closing minutes the Royals went with the extra attacker but Maine turned the tables with two empty-netters of their own for a 5-2 win. Keith Petruzzelli was in goal both nights for the Royals. In the rubber match on Sunday the Mariners again scored the first goal and nursed that 1-0 lead into the third period, Gianfranco Cassaro's score with eight minutes left evened the game at 1-1. Seven minutes of overtime failed to decide the issue, in the shootout Maine outscored the Royals two goals to one and took the game by that same score. Vinnie Purpura got the start on this day and took the decision, the club's record stands at 29-25-11 overall and 15-11-8 at home. A killer five-game road swing looms on the horizon before the club returns home for the final weekend on April 11. Take care, thanks for reading. 

Thursday, March 27, 2025

March 24-27

Wednesday afternoon: back at McCaskey for baseball home game #2, Octorara visited from southwestern Chester County (the school itself is in Chester County but the district itself overlaps into the eastern fringes of Lancaster County). Conditions on this day were markedly different from the previous home date, at 4:15 it was forty-three degrees with winds out to left field at twenty-one miles per hour. The start was not promising, the Red Tornado trailed 3-0 out of the chute. In their half of the first the ballclub loaded the bases with one out on a hit batsmen, an error and a walk. Two runs scored on consecutive wild pitches, Armani Acevedo's RBI hit tied the game 3-3. In the second the visitors went back up by two, in the home third Adrian Rodriguez walked and scored on a Josh Reyes double to make it 5-4. From there it was all Octorara, six unanswered runs over the next three innings brought the final to 11-4. Eli Morales went five innings on the hill with Niko Bergeron out of the bullpen for the last two. The boys play at home again on Friday the 28th (I'm out for the Royals), my next game is on April 2nd when Ephrata visits for the season's first divisional game. Take care, thanks for reading.

Sunday, March 23, 2025

March 21-23

Friday night at the Arena for the second three-in-three weekend of the season, the Norfolk Admirals were the opponent. The roster received some extra fortification during the week with the return of goalie Parker Gahagen from the Phantoms and ex-fan favorite Patrick Bajkov (a member of the 2021-22 squad). Weekends like this are always a stern test for everyone, by the time it's over the teams will have played three games in less than forty-eight hours (and that's with no travel involved, it's exponentially worse when you move between cities). In the opener on Friday Norfolk took a 1-0 lead three minutes in, early in the third period Ryan Leibold found twine to tie it 1-1. Sixty minutes of regulation and seven more of 3-on-3 overtime failed to produce a winner, in the shootout both teams scored in the fifth and ninth rounds before Shane Sellar walked it off in the eleventh for a big 3-2 win. Gahagen picked up the win in his first Royals appearance since mid-November. On Saturday the visiting Admirals evened the weekend with a rather ordinary 4-1 win, Gianfranco Cassaro scored the lone goal for the Royals with Keith Petruzzelli taking the loss in net. The rubber game on Sunday saw the clubs play through a scoreless first period, five minutes into the second Ryan Leibold gave the Royals the lead. Midway through the third Patrick Bajkov scored his "homecoming" goal to make it 2-0. Parker Gahagen came within two minutes of a shutout before the Ads spoiled it but the Royals were able to hold on for a 2-1 victory and a win of the weekend two games to one. The club's record stands at 28-24-10 (18-7-6 since the New Year started), 14-10-7 at home. The next home dates are March 28-30, another 3-in-3 endurance test with the Maine Mariners, Take care, thanks for reading.

Thursday, March 20, 2025

March 17-20

Wednesday afternoon at McCaskey for the first home game of baseball season and my ninth year on the mic (it should be ten but we all remember that story). During basketball season Lebanon is a divisional foe but not so for baseball, on this day they were the opposition for a non-divisional game. At 4:15 gametime it was sixty-nine degrees with a breeze coming in from left field, little did we know at that point this would be a long day's journey into night. The Red Tornado fell behind 2-0 in the first but scored three in their half on base hits by Josh Reyes (two RBI) and Chris Ruggierio (one). After Lebanon tied it in the second JPM again forged ahead on Eli Morales' two-run single in the second to lead 5-3. The visitors got to within one in the third and went ahead with two in the fourth, in the home half Morales doubled and scored on an error to tie it again at 6-6. The game settled down somewhat at that point, there was no further scoring in regulation play. In the eighth Lebanon took the lead 7-6 before JPM tied it when Adrian Rodriguez tripled to deep center, the throw to third got away allowing Adrian to score the tying run. In the  ninth the pattern continued, another Lebanon run was equaled when Elliott Fluck walked and scored on Adrian R's booming double to deep right-center. On we went into the tenth inning where it all came apart, Lebanon scored seven runs and put the game away. JPM scored one final run in their half on an error, the final was 15-9. Niko Bergeron took the loss in relief of starter Elliot Fluck, Eli Morales also worked in relief. By the time the marathon ended it was 8:15pm, it reminded me of some of the L-O-N-G nights I endured when I was in the business Up North at a place I never talk about anymore. The ballclub's next home game is on Wednesday the 26th. Take care, thanks for reading.

Sunday, March 16, 2025

March 14-16

Friday night at the Arena, the Royals returned home from a 1-0-1 road trip to host the Trois-Rivieres Lions for TR's final two visits of the regular season. The club was bolstered during the week with the reassignment of Matt Brown and Keith Petruzzelli from the AHL Phantoms plus the long-awaited return of fan-favorite Yvan Mongo from a long-term injury absence. This was our annual "kids takeover" night, youngsters applied to be a part of the game staff and for the first time I had one assigned to me. A young man named Declan (age 10) worked with me as the "Jr. PA Announcer", his sister Savannah (she's seven) assisted our in-arena host Mike Keller. In the pregame Declan introduced our starting lineup, during the game he did the initial read on goals and penalties and I followed him on the repeat read. He was a little hesitant at first but once he got comfortable there was no stopping him, on the whole it couldn't have worked out much better. In the game itself the Royals trailed 1-0 in the first period before Matt Brown tied it, two goals by TR gave the visitors a 3-1 lead entering the third period. Three minutes into the period Yvan Mongo lit the lamp to make it a one-goal game, twenty-one seconds later it was that man Mongo once again to tie it 3-3. In the final four minutes TR took the lead back on a goalmouth deflection, an empty-netter with three seconds left nailed down a 5-3 Trois-Rivieres win. Right back at it on Saturday night in game #2, this was "St. Hattricks Night" where a lucky fan could win $10,000 if their preselected player scored three goals. On this night the Royals as a unit did not score three goals but what they did was good enough. Mason Primeau gave the Royals the lead nine minutes into the first period, after TR tied it Brock Caufield scored on an offensive-zone steal just over a minute later for a 2-1 lead. For the last forty-four minutes there was no further scoring, the Royals split the weekend with a tough-as-nails 2-1 victory. Keith Petruzzelli was in goal both nights, on Friday he deserved a better fate and on Saturday he got it. The club's mark is 26-23-10, 12-9-7 at home, the next action is on the Friday the 21st when the Norfolk Admirals visit for a three-in-three weekend. Take care, thanks for reading

Thursday, March 13, 2025

March 10-13

The preseason practices for spring high school athletics began on the 3rd, for me that means baseball season at McCaskey is right around the corner. The ballclub played two scrimmages at home on the 11th and 13th, Tuesday was with Central Dauphin East and Milton Hershey came to town on Thursday. Gilbert Vega is back for his fourth season as head coach, he's joined by assistants Carl Mummert and Dave Hinnenkamp. The club has a twenty-game schedule, ten games against divisional opposition (one home, one away) and ten versus non-league opponents. Only eight of the twenty are at home, I'll miss the game on March 28 because of the Royals but every else should be good, the first home game is on the 19th with Lebanon. Take care, thanks for reading.

Sunday, March 9, 2025

March 3-9

A relatively quiet week in what figures to be a busy month, the highlight was a Wednesday night game at the Arena. The four-game homestand ended with the Adirondack Thunder in town for the last of their five regular-season visits. On this night we saw another low-scoring tight-checking kind of game we've seen so often, there was no score into the second period. The Royals finally broke through six minutes in on a breakaway score by Matt Brown, at roughly the same time in the third period Brown struck again to make it 2-0. The Thunder broke the shutout with three minutes left but could come no closer, Cam Cook's empty-netter with thirteen seconds left on the clock put away a 3-1 win for goalie Vinnie Purpura. The record improves to 24-22-9, 11-8-7 at the Arena. The club returns home for a two-game set with Trois-Rivieres on Friday the 14th. Saturday night was the semi-annual clock change, sunset on Sunday came after 7:00 and it will be that way until September 23. Take care, thanks for reading.

Sunday, March 2, 2025

February 28-March 2

Friday night at the Arena for game #2 with the Maine Mariners, on this night Jake Smith gave the Royals a quick 1-0 lead twenty-eight seconds after the opening faceoff. The Mariners tied the game four minutes later, in the late going Shane Sellar lit the lamp to put the Royals ahead at the intermission. In the second period Smith struck again to make it 3-1. In the third the Mariners pulled to within one but a Mason Primeau empty-netter in the final minute wrapped up a 4-2 victory, Vinnie Purpura was goalie of record. Saturday was a busy day at the Arena and it started early, at 1:00 we were in the house for the nineteenth annual Battle Of The Badges. This game has had four different formats through the years, the current setup features first-responders from the City Of Reading versus their counterparts from the rest of Berks County. The game is always a spirited affair no matter the format, on this day the City defeated the County 6-5 on a goal with forty-five seconds left. The Maine Event (pun intended) was at 7:00 as the Royals hosted the Mariners in the rubber game of the series. After a scoreless first period Matt Brown scored thirty seconds into the second giving the Royals the lead. Maine scored twice to take the lead back, after Shane Sellar pulled the Royals even the Mariners scored again for a 3-2 lead at the intermission. Seven minutes into the third period Ryan Leibold tied the score, three minutes later it was Leibold again on the power play to put the Royals up 4-3. In the final minutes the Mariners went with the extra attacker, with forty seconds left Shane Sellar hit the bullseye on the empty net salting away a big 5-3 win, Gage Alexander was the winning goalie as the Royals pull above .500 for the first time since early November at 23-22-9, 10-8-7 at home. The Royals were 10-17-4 during the 2024 portion of the schedule, since the New Year the club is 13-5-5 and has very quietly fought its way back into contention. The Royals finish the current homestand hosting the Adirondack Thunder on the 5th. Take care, thanks for reading