LM Baseball Eyeing State Playoffs This Year

Coming off a 7-12 season a year ago, the Lower Moreland baseball team is eyeing a spot in the state playoffs this season. That will require a record of .500 or better, so the Lions will need a little more production in the 2011 season.

They have six seniors back, and two of them are coming back after missing the entire season last year with an injury. They also have an experienced pitching staff made up of mostly juniors to carry the rotation.

“The pitching staff is basically the same as last year,” second-year Lower Moreland baseball coach Dennis Murphy said. “We have a lot of juniors that pitch, and one sophomore.”

Mark Dougherty is that sophomore, and he has a real chance of stepping up and becoming a star on this team. He split time between junior varsity and the varsity team last year as a first-year playing freshman, and Murphy is looking for him to take that next step.

On the hitting side, the upperclassmen are expected to lead the way.

“We’re senior heavy with the hitting department,” Murphy said. “Jesse Goldstein, Jake Madnick and Jared Licht, will probably be our middle of the order and our leadoff. Some younger guys have some pop like Rob Hoffman, who’s a transfer who we picked up this year.”

Licht and Callan Palmer are two returning All-League players who hit over .400 last season.

Their other teammates will need to step up, too, if Lower Moreland hopes to make the state playoffs. It will be a long process through the regular season that will require making the district tournament first.

“I think we can be better than (.500),” Making the state playoffs is our goal, so we’d probably need to win districts to make that happen, and we need to make districts to do that. But then .500 will probably get us to get into the districts.”

Baby steps.

The first thing Lower Moreland needs to do is take care of business in its Bi-Centennial League games. It will have to contend with the likes of Bristol, Devon Prep, Christopher Dock, Holy Ghost and New Hope.

“We should be one of the top teams in the league,” said Murphy. “They are inexperienced against better competition, but we should be able to compete with them. So those games will probably make or break our season against some of those better teams.”

There is also a group of five freshmen that will split time between the JV and varsity squads. They are: Joe Leventhal, Jack Titus, Jordan Pocrass, Ryan Killion and Tyler Hun.

The Lions will play in two scrimmage games before the season officially opens Friday, March 25 at home against Harriton at 3:45. There is a home scrimmage against Cheltenham on Monday, and Tuesday’s game, originally schedule at Father Judge, will be played at LMHS due to field issues.

To see the baseball schedule, as well as the other spring sports at Lower Moreland, please click the graphic at the top right of the page.

Team Roster
Mark Dougherty (P, OF) So.
Jay Fisher (INF, P) Jr.
Frank Gleason (OF, P) Sr.
Jesse Goldstein (OF) Sr.
Ross Goodman (1B, P) Jr.
Rob Hoffman (INF, P) Jr.
Matt Hyman (OF) Jr.
Tyler Hun (INF, P, DH) Fr.
Mario Incollingo (C, 1B, DH) Sr.
Ryan Killion (INF, C) Fr.
Joe Leventhal (OF, P) Fr.
Jared Licht (SS) Sr.
Jake Madnick (C) Sr.
Callan Palmer (2B, P) Jr.
Lewis Palmer (OF, P) Jr.
Jordan Pocrass (INF, P) Fr.
Mark Rushton (P, OF) Jr.
Max Sandberg (OF) So.
Matt Terrenzio (P, INF) Sr.
Jack Titus (C, INF) Fr.