Livingston Temple Softball League 07/24/16

The first round of the playoffs in the B Division brought a few unexpected surprises yesterday. AABJD / Ohr Torah (3-8) has been in the league since 2011 and had never even been in a playoff game until this season. Matched up against the 9-1 #1 seed Agudath Israel, it didn't look promising. But in 3 extra innings Ohr / Torah prevailed 12-10 to move into the 2nd round next week. In the win, early homeruns off the bats of Amir Goldstein, Eric Feiler and Moshe Berkowitz had OT up 5-3 in the 4th inning. Agudath came back to take the lead 7-6 in the home 5th but it was tied at 7 after 7. Good pitching and good defense stopped the scoring for 2 innings but in the top of the 10th Ohr Torah scored 5 runs while holding CAI to 3 in the home 10th for the victory. Also for the winners, Eric Feiler was 3-5 & Joel Tenneberg 4-5. Pitcher Jerry Blugind finished innings 6-10 with a broken finger from an earlier comebacker.  B'nai Israel has been in the league a lot longer but the #5 seed had never won a playoff game until yesterday when they defeated #4 Temple Emanu-El  22-17. Next week B'nai Israel is matched up with AABJD / Ohr Torah in the 2nd round so one of these teams will be in the finals. #2 seed B'nai Jeshurun won their 1st round game 11-8 over B'nai Abraham. They will face #3 B'nai Or who defeated Beth Shalom 15-6. B'nai Or was up 10-1 after 2 innings and played solid defense the whole way never letting Beth Shalom get close. 11 out of the last 12 outs were on the ground including the game ending double play. SS Jason Cohen fielded 7 grounders with no errors. Jason also had a HR along with Bill Schlosser ( 3 RBI's , 3B) and Scott Charles.

Sharey Tefilo Israel took care of business in the A Division as the #1 seed outscored Temple Sholom 14-6. They will now face AABJD who defeated Temple Sinai 17-10. In the win, Greg Zuckerman had a 3 run homer with Chaim Goldman & Marty Moskovitz each knocking in 3 runs. #2 Pine Brook got by Suburban Torah 18-13 and they will face B'nai Brith in the 2nd round. Chabad jumped out in front of B'nai Brith 6-0 but in the bottom of the 2nd BB scored 4 to tighten the game up. BB was still down 7-5 into the bottom of the 5th but scored 4 to take a 9-7 lead and held on for the 10-9 win. A well pitched game by Wayne Neumann and strong defense by Ira Pearlman (LF) and Andrew Kasdan (SS) helped shut down Chabad from making a comeback. They had the tying run on 2nd with 2 outs in the top of the 7th. On offense, Paul Velelis, Andrew Kasdan, Ken Merber and Greg Weinberger all had timely hits for the winners.