It has been a month since the Lancaster Bible College baseball team put together back-to-back games in which they hit well, pitched well and won. After Monday's sweep of Valley Forge Christian, the wait is over. The Chargers got two dominant pitching performances from Richard Westerlund and Patrick Hart and the batters gave them plenty of support at the plate, as LBC won 8-1 in game one and 7-3 in game two. 

With the victory, LBC is now 3-1 in East Region play, and needs to win one of two games at Baptist Bible College this weekend to clinch the number one seed and host the East Region Playoffs on April 20.

"We want to host the region tournament," Chargers' Head Coach T.J. Horn said. "That has been one of our goals from the beginning."

On Monday, the Chargers looked like a team that wanted to host the region championship. Leading 1-0 in game one in the bottom of the third, the Chargers loaded the bases twice and scored six runs to take a commanding, 7-0 lead.

Frank DiFilippo continued to swing a hot bat, going 2-for-3 in game one with three runs batted in. Not to be outdone, freshman Kody Godsey had two hits of his own and drove in two runs. Sophomore Richard Westerlund threw six strong innings, giving up just two hits, while striking out two. The win was his third of the season.

"Richard pitched very well today," Horn said. "We brought Justin Long in for the seventh just to show them something different."

The Chargers jumped out to an early lead in game two as well, scoring twice in the opening frame. They held that lead until the top of the fourth when Valley Forge Christian tied the game at 2-2 on a Matt McKenzie two-run home run.

After two quick outs in the bottom half of the fourth inning, Josh Chamberlin and John Smith IV drew walks. After advancing to second and third on a passed ball, Chamberlin and Smith advanced again, this time on a Patriots' error on a batted ball by Sean Westerlund. BJ Boosz and DiFilippo hit back-to-back singles to score two more runs, increasing LBC's lead to 5-2.

The Patriots (5-17) cut the lead to 5-3 in the top of the fifth, but the Chargers tacked on two more runs in the bottom of the sixth to extend the lead to 7-3. Boosz finished with three hits, while DiFilippo added two more. He is now batting .434 with 24 runs batted in. He is looking to become the first LBC player to bat .400 in a season since 2008, when T.J. Horn hit .495.

Hart picked up his third victory of the season, tying Westerlund for the team lead. He scattered five hits over seven innings and struck out six.

The Chargers are off until Saturday when they travel to Clarks Summit, Pa. to take on the Defenders. First pitch is scheduled for 1 p.m.