The playoff system in the Lehigh Valley Legion League presents some interesting scenarios.

Take Tuesday night for instance. South Parkland and North Parkland had been rained out Monday night and pushed back for a day. That meant that the finals of the double elimination tournament could conceivably drag into a Wednesday night game, cutting down the rest for pitchers on the two teams.

Plus, both teams were guaranteed a spot in regionals, so the tournament championship was more for bragging rights than anything else. Of course, between these two teams, bragging rights are everything.

South Parkland earned its spot in regionals as the regular season champion. The tournament winner was guaranteed the league’s second spot, unless the Trojans won that tournament as well.

If that was the case, then the other team in the finals was also guaranteed a spot in the regional tournament which gets underway on Friday at Boyertown High School.

That meant that neither team wanted to play a second game because it would make pitch counts especially important since pitchers are limited in how many pitches they can throw in a game and over a certain number of days.

With that in mind, the scenario for South Parkland manager Will Algard was one where he could worry more about pitch counts than winning the game to keep his pitching staff deeper for the start of regionals.

“You always want to win, and we never come into anything to lose,” said Algard. “However, we still know what the ultimate goal is (a state championship), so this is just a gap, a part of it. The rest does affect pitching, but I want to win this thing (the league tournament).

“We know we’re already going past this, but even knowing that, it would have hurt us a little to have to play tomorrow (Wednesday) because our pitchers would have less rest, but we can work with that. We wanted to win, especially because of who we were playing.”

As it turned out, South Parkland did not win the game, falling 6-2. The game turned in one inning where North Parkland scored six runs. Coming into the inning, the Buffaloes had just one base runner on a walk, but the hot, humid weather appeared to wear down starter Sawyer Marsteller a little and when hits started to drop in, the right-hander was unable to stop the rally.

A big play came early in the fourth inning with the bases loaded for North Parkland and one out. Gavin Mohry singled to left field to bring in Peyton Scherff with the game-tying run and Nate Unger racing toward the plate. Left fielder Jack Streeter’s throw was high and catcher Grant Damweber made a leaping catch and quickly came down with the tag, appearing to have gotten Unger before him reaching the plate. Unger was called safe and Algard, normally a laid back sort of coach, walked to the plate to argue the play, but his argument was rejected by the home plate umpire.

“That was a big play,” said Algard. “We would have had the second out and the game would have been tied, and who knows what happens from there. Instead, it’s 2-1 and one out. You have to hand it to them because that was a big run, and they used that momentum to put together a big inning.”

South Parkland has the pitching depth – and the extra day of rest – to make a run in regionals. What they don’t have are bragging rights. North Parkland also has a team strong enough to go deep in regionals as the LVL looks to make a statement and send a team on to states.

As league president Jeff Smith told both teams after the medal ceremony.

“I’d like to see you both do well and have an all Lehigh Valley League final at regionals. I’ll be rooting for both of you.”

The comment was met with cheers and a lot of nodding by the players who have just that as a dream scenario that plays out in Boyertown.