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Double-Dozen: Point Beach Powers Way to OCT Semifinal with 24-Run Onslaught

Matt Manley|April 30, 2025|Last Updated May 8, 2025

POINT PLEASANT BEACH — To a man, the players on the Point Pleasant Beach baseball team take pride in boasting a lineup that does not include an easy out from the top of the bottom all the way to the No. 9 spot.

On days like Tuesday, when the Garnet Gulls hosted Toms River South in the Ocean County Tournament quarterfinals, there are hardly any outs to be had in Point Beach’s lineup.

Facing an Indians team that beat them via mercy rule in Toms River on April 15, Point Beach got its revenge and then some with a 24-5 rout of Toms River South that sends the Garnet Gulls to the Ocean County Tournament semifinal for the second straight year.

“This was the game we had circled,” junior catcher Dan Lubach said. “We knew we had to get the job done today, especially in this tournament if want to go all the way.”

Point Beach’s offensive onslaught was full of eye-opening statistical nuggets beyond the 24 runs. Junior catcher Dan Lubach went 3-for-5 with two doubles, a home run and nine RBI and did so in relentless fashion. Lubach drove in exactly three runs in each of the first three innings.

In each of those first three innings, Point Beach sent at least 12 batters to the plate for a total of 38 plate appearances. In those 38 plate appearances, the Garnet Gulls went 17-for-28 (.607) with seven walks and two hit-by-pitches, including seven doubles and one home run.

“We can do this against any team,” Lubach said. “Our offense can break out at any point, regardless of how many outs we have in an inning.”

Toms River South actually held a 1-0 lead Tuesday thanks to a leadoff single and stolen base by junior Jaden Geremia, followed by an RBI ground-rule double by classmate Ben McEwan to drive him in. The lead was short-lived and by the time Toms River South came back to bat in the top of the second, the Indians trailed, 10-1.

“I think that’s the thing people have to realize about our team,” Lubach said. “We can go down 1-0, we can go down 5-0. We’re going to fight back. We’re going to fight back until that last out is called. We always look back to that Middlesex game last year (in the NJSIAA Central Jersey Group I championships game). We were down to our last strike and down a few runs and we came back. So we’re never out of it. We don’t stop.”

Lubach and senior Noah Banick each drove in three runs during the first inning, which included an RBI double and a two-run double by Banick — the first of which tied the game, 1-1. Banick’s two-run double was also the second of two ground-rule doubles in the first inning, the first off which jumped off the bat of senior Dan Storch.

Two errors in the first allowed four runs to score and make it a 6-1 game before the Garnet Gulls reloaded the bases ahead of Banick’s ground-rule double to make it 8-1. Lubach followed with a line drive that touched down just inside the rightfield line for a two-run double that capped the first-inning scoring.

In the second inning, sophomore Dan Coleman made it 12-1 with a two-run single and Lubach later hit a pop-up into shallow leftfield that caught caught in the wind and eluded a convergence of Toms River South defenders. With the bases loaded and all three runners running on contact with two out, Lubach coasted into second base with a three-run double and a 15-1 lead for his team. Storch then made it a six-run inning and a 16-1 lead with an RBI single through the middle.

“We do a lot of situational stuff at practice,” Banick said. “We are very situationally aware when we hit and it shows in games like this.”

Geremia and McEwan again ignited a run-scoring inning for Toms River South that got the Indians two runs back, including one on an RBI single by junior Evan Schmidt. Point Beach, however, went right back to work in the third inning and loaded the bases for Banick, who hit a sacrifice fly to centerfielder for a 17-3 lead. Lubach followed and smoked a line drive over the centerfield fence for a three-run home run, landing him at nine RBI for the game and pushing Point Beach’s 20th run across the plate.

“We’ve got to keep the pedal down in games like this,” Lubach said. “We have been letting up lately against some teams we thought we had beat. We thought we had these guys beat last time, but we stepped off and gave them an opportunity. You give a team like this an opportunity to win, they’re going to beat you.”

The Garnet Gulls capped their eight-run third with an RBI double by senior and No. 9 hitter Chris Napolitano and a two-run double by junior starting pitcher Tommy Conroy. Conroy pitched three innings to earn the win, surrendering three runs on five hits while striking out five.

Point Beach was on a mission Tuesday, not only because of the loss to Toms River South exactly two weeks earlier but to atone for a 4-3 loss on Monday to Manchester, which improved to 3-9 with its upset of the Garnet Gulls — the No. 5 team in the Shore Sports Insider Top 10. In the April 15 loss to Toms River South, the Indians scored nine runs in the bottom of the fifth inning to turn a narrow 5-4 lead into a 14-4 victory via the 10-run rule.

“They were posting stuff online about our team and we wanted to use that against them,” Banick said. “We came back today and took it.”

The losses to Point Beach and Manchester are the only two defeats suffered by Point Beach this season and neither was a game within the Garnet Gulls’ Shore Conference Class B North division schedule. Point Beach is a perfect 8-0 inside its new division and now 2-0 in the Ocean County Tournament. After spending nearly all its existence as a Shore Conference team in the Class B Central division, the Garnet Gulls were challenged with a move to a division with more competition from top-to-bottom in the standings.

Ironically, it was a tournament game in which Point Beach played its first game in which it handled a team in a fashion similar to the typical one-sided games in Class B Central, which Point Beach’s coaching staff and players were more than happy to leave behind. Last year, Point Beach won 17 games via 10-run rule, including all 14 of its division games. Point Beach scored 20 runs four times in those 14 division wins.

This season, Point Beach has now won three games via 10-run rule and prior to Tuesday, Point Beach had not scored more than 13 runs in a game. The tempered run-scoring is a product of a more competitive schedule, but even against significantly better competition, Point Beach was averaging 7.9 runs per game before Tuesday’s onslaught.

“It’s nice to have a game like this because our offense gets our confidence back,” Lubach said. “Our pitchers can just go out there and roll ground balls and we don’t have to worry about anything. We can also give a little stress break to our coaches. They have been dying lately.”

With the revenge win over Toms River South, Point Beach will now look to redeem itself for last year’s OCT shortcoming. Point Beach upset Donovan Catholic to reach the OCT semifinal with a group largely comprised of players who remain in prominent roles this year. In the semifinals, the Garnet Gulls lost to Jackson Memorial, 12-2, before going to win a third straight Group I championship and reaching the Group I final for the first time in program history.

This time around, Point Beach will host the semifinal on Saturday, when the Garnet Gulls welcome No. 3 seed and defending Ocean County Tournament champion Toms River East — fresh off a 7-0 win over Brick in its quarterfinal game.

“We’re very confident,” Lubach said. “I think a lot of us agree we deserve this opportunity and we’re ready to shock the Shore and Ocean County.”

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