'Casablanca' actress Madeleine LeBeau dies at 92

BC-PA--Pennsylvania News Digest, PA

<p>HAZLETON &#8212; It wasn&#8217;t going to be an easy senior day, having to watch from the dugout. Dante Biasi made sure to stay involved just the same.</p><p>The Hazleton Area standout kept busy on Thursday. Firing up the team during rallies and keeping them loud and vocal. Talking things over with a young pitcher who was pulled in the third inning. Relaying info to the catcher.</p><p>For Biasi, it will be a while yet before he can get back on the diamond himself. The hard-throwing lefty has Tommy John surgery on the horizon and the rehabilitation time is typically at least a year.</p><p>A tear in the ulnar collateral ligament of his elbow kept one of the area&#8217;s best players out of the entire Wyoming Valley Conference season this spring. He found other ways to contribute.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s tough,&#8221; Cougars coach Gino Cara said. &#8220;Not being in uniform and not playing, it&#8217;s tough to be in a great leadership role. But boy, he&#8217;s taken these young pitchers on the side. And when they&#8217;re throwing (bullpen sessions), he&#8217;s talking about pitching. It&#8217;s had an immeasurable influence on this year&#8217;s team.</p><p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve pitched extraordinarily well, and I think he&#8217;s a credit to that. He really is. There&#8217;s no doubt.&#8221;</p><p>Despite missing Biasi and fellow senior Evan Hauze in the rotation, the Cougars still managed to take a 2.33 team ERA over 12 WVC games into the weekend. The three main starters have been sophomore Scott Shamany, junior Colin Stauffer and sophomore Alex Klein.</p><p>Stauffer has a 1.25 ERA in 28 innings during league play, going the distance in three of his four starts while walking just five batters. He managed to blank Wyoming Valley West on Wednesday, allowing just four singles against last year&#8217;s state finalist.</p><p>Hazleton opened the conference slate against Valley West back in April, a rematch of last year&#8217;s district title game, won by the Spartans. Biasi was not in the lineup.</p><p>The trouble started when he was experiencing numbness in his finger.</p><p>&#8220;Right there, I took a couple days off,&#8221; Biasi said. &#8220;And after that, I came back in batting practice maybe two or three days later and just took a swing and my forearm got tight. I went home that night and talked to my parents and I said, &#8216;We gotta go to the doctors.&#8217;</p><p>&#8220;At first they did an ultrasound on it where they could see it. And they said they didn&#8217;t think there was anything really wrong. Then a couple weeks later, we got the MRI back and it came back that I had a tear in the UCL.&#8221;</p><p>Rough news for anyone, let alone a pitcher who was drawing plenty of interest from pro scouts on top of his scholarship to play in college for Penn State.</p><p>Up next is a trip to Dr. James Andrews&#8217; Institute for Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine in Florida on May 24. From there, he&#8217;ll have a decision to make depending on what happens in June&#8217;s Major League draft whether to play professionally or collegiately.</p><p>Biasi said he&#8217;s been in frequent contact with Penn State, where his older brother &#8212; former Hazleton Area multi-sport star Sal &#8212; is also a pitcher for the Nittany Lions.</p><p>&#8220;They&#8217;ve been really helpful,&#8221; Biasi said. &#8220;I talk to the coaches almost everyday. They said everything&#8217;s going to be the same, it&#8217;s just a matter of it being a different (time frame) now. So maybe not next year because I&#8217;d probably have to redshirt, but in two years I&#8217;ll probably be playing again.&#8221;</p><p>Citing research by doctors at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, a 2015 Sports Illustrated report said that roughly 80 percent of first-time Tommy John patients are able to return to their pre-surgical level of performance.</p><p>Encouraging news for the future, but a difficult thing to deal with right at the start of a senior season. Hazleton Area was already replacing eight seniors who started in last May&#8217;s district title game. Biasi was the only hitter from that lineup who was set to return.</p><p>Of course, the main attraction was on the mound.</p><p>&#8220;Not having him this year, our record is (11-7 overall),&#8221; Cara said. &#8220;If he&#8217;s in the lineup, let&#8217;s knock about four games the other way. Not to say he was unbeatable, but boy, he was as close to unhittable in this area in a long, long time. Just a long, long time.</p><p>&#8220;Great velocity, but he knows how to pitch, too. He comes at you with three, four pitches and he has the intelligence. You don&#8217;t teach the game intelligence he has. He knows the game.&#8221;</p><p>With plenty of new regulars playing this spring, it took some time for the Cougars to adjust.</p><p>&#8220;In the beginning of the season, we weren&#8217;t really together as a team,&#8221; sophomore pitcher Johnathan Pozniak said. &#8220;But now we&#8217;re starting to get together and starting to work well with each other.&#8221;</p><p>This past week helped plenty in that regard.</p><p>Livan Reinoso hit a two-run homer in the bottom of the sixth to beat Valley West on Wednesday. The next day, the Cougars won again on a two-run shot &#8212; this time in the seventh off the bat of Klein &#8212; to close out the home schedule by beating Pittston Area.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s kind of been a long season,&#8221; Biasi said. &#8220;No one&#8217;s really been hitting as well as really would&#8217;ve liked. &#8230; But the way we played against (Valley West), picking up that win really helped us out confidence-wise.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;I think once we got the first home run, we all got really excited,&#8221; Pozniak said. &#8220;The energy was a lot more lively in the dugout and on the field. We started to put everything together.&#8221;</p><p>Even though he hasn&#8217;t been able to play, Biasi has been able to help serve as a bridge between the previous group at Hazleton Area and the one that will open up district tournament play on the road on May 23.</p><p>A crazy season for all involved. And it&#8217;s not over yet.</p><p>&#8220;These guys are a great group of people,&#8221; Biasi said. &#8220;Really, it was a whole new team. I was used to playing with our core nine that we had since 2014. This year we knew it was going to be a little bit different.</p><p>&#8220;But I love being here. I wouldn&#8217;t trade this team for anybody.&#8221;</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Hazleton Area&#8217;s Dante Biasi is scheduled to undergo Tommy John surgery at the Dr. James Andrews&#8217; Institute for Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine in Florida on May 24. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/web1_TTL050215Berwick-HazletonBB_2.jpg</photo0><caption0>Hazleton Area&#8217;s Dante Biasi is scheduled to undergo Tommy John surgery at the Dr. James Andrews&#8217; Institute for Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine in Florida on May 24. </caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/web1_hazletonberwick01-1.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Hazleton Area pitcher Dante Biasi has been a valuable presence for Cougar pitchers this season. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/web1_hazletonberwick01-1.jpg</photo1><caption1>Hazleton Area pitcher Dante Biasi has been a valuable presence for Cougar pitchers this season. </caption1><photoCredit1></photoCredit1></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/web1_TommyJohnSurgery.jpg">
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<div class="metaInfo"><subheadMeta>Hazleton Area senior gearing up for Tommy John surgery</subheadMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Derek Levarse</p><p>dlevarse@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Derek Levarse at 570-991-6396 or on Twitter @TLdlevarse</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Hazleton Area’s Dante Biasi’s senior season cut short; prepares for Tommy John surgery