The Franklin Regional baseball team begins its climb toward a WPIAL championship tomorrow, Friday, and the first road block to its title hopes is a meeting with Butler Area.

The Panthers, who finished the regular season 13-4 overall and 9-3 in Section 2-AAAA behind Hempfield Area at 10-2, will travel to John Herb Field tomorrow at 3 p.m. to face the fourth-place team from Section 1, Butler Area (12-6).

The winner will face Plum (17-3), which received a first-round bye in the Quad A tournament bracket.

"I don't know too much about (Butler). I've gotten bits and pieces of scouting reports. The first five hitters are very good. They have speed and power. Those are the guys that we're going to have to key on," coach Larry Wayman said.

"We don't want to let the bottom of the lineup on base. We have to make them earn it, so the top of the lineup doesn't hurt us with RBIs."

Taking the hill for the Panthers will be senior Duquesne University recruit Mike Pelekanos, who boasted a 2.40 earned run average this season.

"As Mike's done all year long, he puts on a good performance. He throws strikes. He'll challenge the hitters," Wayman said of Pelekanos, who along with senior Steve Ferimer (1.40 ERA) form one of the top pitching tandems in the WPIAL.

"Him and Ferimer provides us a good one-two punch. Between the two of them, we're confident they can keep the run production down.

"All of the guys out of the bullpen have done very good -- Josh Robinette, Preston Jones and Greg Moore. Moore has come in all season long and been lights out. He's had a great year."

Pelekanos and Ferimer also were two of the team's top batters during the section season.

Joel Ackerman led the team with a .517 batting average, followed by Seve Franceshelli at .476, Ferimer and Pelekanos at .450 and Marc Cassella at .384. Pelekanos led the squad with 17 RBIs and two home runs, as well.

"All five of them hit on a consistent basis for us," Wayman said.

Alex Buccilli has added an important dimension as the leadoff man with a high on-base percentage, followed by Franceshelli, Pelekanos and Cassella in the lineup. Ferimer and Ackerman have hit sixth and seventh this season, while teammates Andy Parnell, Joe Fornataro, James Verona and Robinette have added balance to the talented group.

Franklin Regional will try to stick to the formula that has helped it to a strong season so far.

"We've got to stay consistent. When we get guys on base, we have to do a better job of scoring runs. We've got to do a better job of moving runners up," said Wayman, citing the importance of the short game in the playoffs.

"We're going to have to do the little things on offense to generate a good, balanced attack."