The inaugural East Coast Collegiate Baseball League regular season came to a close Sunday, July 21.
The Quakertown Blazers (15-16-2) sneaked into the playoffs, winning four of their last five games and securing the third spot in the Northern Division.
The ECCBL playoffs will be played over this weekend.
Friday night, July 26, with a first pitch of 6:30 p.m. at Memorial Park, the Blazers will play as the away team against Southside (21-12).
At Moody Park, the Mercer Mammoths (16-18) will face the Trenton Generals (14-19-1).
These are both elimination games.
The rest of the playoffs will be hosted at Memorial Park in Quakertown, located at 600 W. Mill St.
On Saturday, the winner of the Moody Park game will play Scranton (22-12) at 1 p.m. and the winner of the Friday night Memorial Park game will play the Trenton Capitals (17-16-1) at 5 p.m.
The ECCBL 2024 Championship Game will be played at 1 p.m. on Sunday.
Heading into the playoffs, the Blazers look to maintain the success they had from their bullpen over the second half of the season.
On hosting the inaugural playoffs for the league, Blazers General Manager Chris Ray expressed his excitement.
“It’s great to host the inaugural ECCBL playoffs,” he said. “The Borough of Quakertown did an amazing job renovating our stadium last year and for the ECCBL to give us the opportunity to host the playoffs and show that off is awesome.”
He added, “We look forward to having so many great players competing on the field and providing them a top tier collegiate summer baseball experience.”
Against Southside in the regular season, the Blazers fell to them four times and won one of the five matchups.
The last time the two teams faced off was July 10, right before the Blazers heated up.
On June 25 at Memorial Park, the Blazers dropped the matchup 13-1, but Mason Woolwine hit a home run, the Blazers’ first of the season at Memorial Park.
“We had our backs up against the wall in terms of earning a playoff berth for the last week and a half, and our guys responded with a 6-1-2 record in our last nine with heavy pressure from Pocono, who was playing great baseball,” Ray said.
“Huge credit to Coach (Mike) Fitzgerald and his staff for sticking with it and our players who have kept their heads down through the tough start to the season and continued to show up, work hard and apply the work to the games.”
Players are excited for the fresh slate playoffs provide. Games at Memorial Park all postseason ensure they’ll always have the Blazers’ faithful in attendance.
“Heading into playoffs we know nothing matters of what you did during the season and that anything can happen on any day,” said Mike Pascoe, Blazers utility infielder and right-handed pitcher. “So with that being said I feel we are playing our best baseball at this point and are looking to go out and compete at our highest level and leave it all out on the field and see if we can make a run.”
Fitzgerald talked throughout the season about how he lets Pascoe go out and coach the bullpen and the high energy and leadership he brings to every game.
“Coach Fitzgerald has put a lot of trust into me by talking to our other pitchers and trying to help each other out to try and make sure we perform at our best. I can’t take all the credit, all of our pitchers have great stuff and mechanics that they share amongst our staff, which allows us all to grow and become better as a unit,” Pascoe said.
The Blazers look to keep their energy levels high and mindsets full of confidence. They want to make a run in the playoffs, and are set up to do so, playing their best baseball of the season right now.
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