Stellar pitching helps North Allegheny finish regular season on high note

By: Josh Rizzo
Friday, May 17, 2019 | 7:17 AM

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Finishing the regular season on a heater doesn’t lend itself to happy endings.

North Allegheny baseball squeaked into the playoffs a year ago, but used the momentum from playing tight games down the stretch to qualify for the PIAA Class 6A playoffs.

The Tigers ended this year with eight straight wins, placed second in Section 1-6A and blanked four of their last five opponents.

But North Allegheny, which opened the WPIAL playoffs as the fourth seed playing the winner of Peters Township and Butler in a game too late for this edition, knows few will remember how the regular season ended.

“I’ll be honest, I don’t know if there’s any perfect way to end the regular season,” Tigers coach Andrew Heck said. “I don’t know if it does anything. It could be a negative; last year it felt like we were already playing playoff games and we were used to that success. I think that’s what led to our success.”

Pitching has been a major factor of success for this group of Tigers (15-5). North Allegheny has a team ERA of 1.83 and has seven pitchers who have recorded at least one win.

Penn State recruit Ryan Partridge is 4-1 with a 1.70 ERA, Dayton commit Anthony Hattrup is 4-1 with a 1.33 ERA and Zach Trdinich has a 3-0 mark with a 2.63 ERA.

Trevor Freyvogel, Kevin Schott, Shane Murphy and Ben Tharpe have also collected wins for the Tigers.

Having so many arms makes it difficult for Heck to get everyone on the mound.

“That’s the hard part is getting everyone their innings,” Heck said. “When you are limited to 20 games, it’s difficult. There are guys on our pitching staff right now that are going to pitch in college next year, and I couldn’t get them the innings they wanted or I wanted.”

Finding a way to mix everyone in relies on a long-term approach.

Heck has consistently said this season he would feel comfortable playing a 30-game season. With that in mind, Heck tried not to push the pitchers too hard at the outset.

“We stay as fresh as possible early, so late in the year we are fresh and hit our stride,” Heck said. “Even late in the season, the biggest thing hitting home is location, location, location. If we can throw more than one pitch for a strike, we will be in good shape.”

Tags: North Allegheny