The Emmaus Legion team didn’t have a whole lot of luck in the postseason this year. It all started when it finished the regular season at 9-9 and in a four-way tie in the Lehigh Valley Legion League.

Because all four teams were 1-1 against each other, the seeding for the fourth through seventh spots had to be decided by a series of coin tosses. Emmaus lost every toss and wound up seeded seventh, pitting it against no. 2 seed South Parkland in the first round of the playoffs.

“I wasn’t really surprised when we lost all of the coin tosses,” said Emmaus head coach Tom Cichocki. “I don’t have a lot of luck in those things, it’s why I don’t play the lottery.”

Emmaus and South Parkland were tied going to the seventh inning and the Hornets went down in order. In the bottom of the inning, a lead-off walk proved to be the undoing for Emmaus as one out later Harrison Rabenold doubled to drive in the winning run, handing Emmaus a 7-6 loss and its first defeat in the double-elimination tournament.

“We played a good game,” said Cichocki. “I told the guys that if we play the way we did today, we’re going to win a lot of those games.

“They’re a good team and in the end they were able to pull it out and beat us, so we have to tip our hats to them. This makes things tougher for us – a lot tougher – but the effort is there and we just have to keep playing hard.”

The loss sent the Hornets to the loser’s bracket, where each game is an elimination game. Emmaus was paired against rival Lower Macungie in its next game, after the Lightning lost to North Parkland in the first round of the playoffs.

Like they did against South Parkland, the Hornets played well against Lower Macungie, but this time, trouble struck in the bottom of the sixth inning.

With the score tied 1-1, another walk would wind up sinking the Hornets. With one out, Luke Weider drew a walk and stole second and Nick Andronis singled to drive him in with the go-ahead run.

Starting pitcher Logan Foley came back to get the next two batters and end the inning, leaving it up to the Emmaus offense in the seventh.

Lower Mac’s Trey Hinkle had retired four straight batters, and he stretched that to seven straight, putting Emmaus down in order in the seventh and eliminating the Hornets from the playoffs.

“We had some chances, but just couldn’t get the hit that we needed to push across a run,” said Cichocki. “They made a couple errors and we should have taken advantage of that, but we just couldn’t get that one hit to make a difference in the game.”

Emmaus saw different players contribute in the two playoff games. Against South Parkland, Eric Cichocki went 3-for-4 with a stolen base and a run scored, and Taden Gery had two hits and reached on an error, scoring one run and driving in two.

Evan Marushak had two hits and scored Emmaus’ lone run against Lower Macungie, and Foley threw a complete game, striking out five batters.

Emmaus hasn’t won a Legion playoff game in eight seasons, but Tom Cichocki wasn’t ready to talk about any jinx or added pressure from that streak.

“We didn’t really talk about it,” he said. “I’m sure some of the guys know about it, but it’s not like it’s the same guys every year, so I don’t think they really were concerned about that. We played well, [Tyler] Kish pitched really well for us against South Parkland and we had some offense, and today, Logan threw a great game and held down a pretty good offensive team.

“We can hold our heads high knowing that we played hard and pushed two really good teams all the way.”