Salisbury entered the Lehigh Valley Legion finals against Whitehall on Monday night with the upper hand. As the only undefeated team throughout the tournament, Salisbury would have to lose two games to the Zephyrs in order to allow Whitehall to claim the league championship. Salisbury needed just one win to advance to regionals.

The two teams were very familiar with each other, having met three times during the regular season and having already played once in the postseason. The Falcons won one of the three regular season meetings but had beaten Whitehall earlier in the playoffs.

From the very start, the skies over the Church Lane field in Lower Macungie Township were dark and occasional thunder could be heard in the distance. The two teams took the field hoping they could get the game in to avoid a doubleheader on Tuesday.

Whitehall picked up an early run against starter Andrew Grejda when Zack Hartman singled and scored on a double by Dylan Carfara. The Zephyrs added to their lead in the third when Matt Snyder led off with a walk and stole second before advancing to third on a ground ball. Back-to-back singles from Owen Ness and Hartman, along with the help of an error, plated two runs and Carfara followed with a double to make it a 4-0 lead for Whitehall.

“We were a little quiet, but I don’t think anybody had doubts in their minds that we couldn’t come back,” said Salisbury’s Hunter Rothrock of falling behind by four runs. “We really wanted to win it tonight because we don’t want to play more than we have to, and I have vacation I’ve got to get off to and I already delayed it for this game.”

Snyder, who started the game for Whitehall, was breezing early in the game. The right-hander retired 12 of the first 13 batters he faced after allowing a one-out single to Nick Bergeman in the first inning. Through the first four innings, the skies had grown even darker, and an occasional drop of rain fell from, but the teams were able to play on.

The bottom of the fifth brought changes as the Salisbury offense came alive and the game conditions became threatening. Tim Schware led off the fourth by drawing a walk, which was followed by singles from Quinn Warmkessel and Nathan Seiger.

The Salisbury rally was suddenly delayed by lightning in the area and went into a short delay with the game resuming approximately 15 minutes later.

It looked like the delay was just what Snyder needed as he returned to the mound and struck out the first two batters he faced, but Rothrock followed with a two-run double and Bergeman then walked to reload the bases. Errors by Whitehall on back-to-back plays plated three more runs as the Falcons took a 5-4 lead in the game.

“I just wanted to make contact in that spot and wasn’t looking to get too fancy,” said Rothrock of his hit to cut the Whitehall lead to 4-2. “That lightning delay came at a bad time because we had momentum going, but we weren’t going to give up and we wanted to end this tonight.”

Warmkessel came on to relieve Grejda and was firing strikes. Warmkessel struck out the first two batters he faced in the sixth and then fanned two more in the seventh, throwing two perfect innings for Salisbury to lock up the win.

As the Lehigh Valley League champion, Salisbury now advances to the Region Two tournament, which begins Friday when they will play the winner of the Berks County League which has yet to be determined.