TOWAMENCIN- The #2-seed kicked off their district championship quest with a win over the Royals and had all the key hits they needed for success.

“The first one is always the hard one.  You’re coming out, all the pressure and all that, and they got the first one…in playoff softball, it’s good defense, timely hitting, and good pitching and we got the timely hitting with Elia and Jordan’s home runs so that’s what it’s going to take.  Get runners on base, we gotta get that hit and we did today,” Head Coach Rick Torresani said.

The North Penn Knights (19-1) beat the Upper Darby Royals (13-7) 9-0, in the second round of district playoffs after a first round BYE.

Sophomore pitcher Mady Volpe got off to a shaky start as the Royals loaded the bases up in the 1^st inning with 2 outs.  Fortunately for the Knights, Volpe worked out of it with a strikeout on three straight pitches to get them out of the jam.  Volpe finished with the complete game shutout with 13 strikeouts, including her 200^th strikeout of the season, and allowed 3 hits along with 3 walks.

“I kinda was [nervous], I was a little like shaken up, but Amanda came up to me and said ‘relax you got this’ and that really calmed me down especially for Amanda because we’re really good friends,” Volpe said on her transition from the first inning to the rest of the game.

Catcher, Amanda Greaney, put the first run up on the board with a sac fly that scored Sophia Collins.  Then first baseman, Elia Namey, came up with two runners on base and sent a big fly over the fence for a 3-run home run as the Knights went up 4-0.

“It think it was really helpful because I know that we could help Mady relax in the field if we just got that lead and so I knew [Rebecca Sorrentino, Upper Darby’s pitcher] was throwing a nice first pitch strike so when that came in, I just went for it,” Namey explained.

In the bottom of the 5^th, Victoria Juckniewitz scored thanks to a wild pitch.  In the 6^th, the bases were loaded for second baseman, Jordan Pietrzykoski, who hit a 1-1 pitch that had just enough carry to get over the left field fence for a grand slam.  The Knights had the 9-0 lead and sealed their trip to the quarter-finals.

“I was seeing a lot of high and I knew that I couldn’t take anything too high or obviously I’d lift but I was just waiting to get my pitch, waiting to get something I could hit and I just took it,” Pietrzykoski said.

And they will meet the winner of #7 Haverford vs #23 Perkiomen Valley on Friday.

“Just work hard tomorrow, come ready to play…and we just gotta do what we did today.  We did have one error but we gotta make sure we don’t have any errors and get the timely hitting.  That’s what it’s all about and these kids are just locked in,” Coach Torresani said.