A wake up call.

That's how Tamaqua coach Mike VanBuskirk described his team's 7-4 loss to Valley East in the opener of the District 18 11-12 year-old Little League tournament on Monday.The defeat dropped the squad to the loser's bracket and into must-win situations the rest of the way in order to move on.Facing a similarly desperate Hazleton team last night at Bill Angst Stadium, Tamaqua bounced back in a big way with a convincing 9-3 victory."I think after the success this team had last year we were a little overconfident starting the tournament," VanBuskirk said. "I think the loss (to Valley East) earlier in the week woke us up."We played a lot more loose today. We put the ball in play, made more contact and made the other team make some mistakes. But getting that first game out of the way definitely helped."Those mistakes proved to be too much for Hazleton to overcome, as Tamaqua capitalized on a handful of errors to jump out to an 8-0 lead after the first three innings."The errors in the first three innings killed us," Hazleton coach John Herness said of his team's miscues. "They can't wait until the fourth or fifth inning to come alive and start scoring runs."While those lapses may have contributed to Hazleton's slow start, Tamaqua also did its part at the plate, delivering clutch hits in key situations.Tamaqua started to gain momentum in the first when Luke VanBuskirk gave the team a 1-0 lead on a double to center field that scored Brian Milot, who reached on a leadoff single to start the inning.The home team proved to be even more opportunistic in the second, batting around and scoring four runs while taking advantage of four Hazleton errors to take a 5-0 lead.After showing it could play small ball and score by moving runners over the two previous innings, Tamaqua put on a power display in the top of the third.Following an error that allowed Michael Shanta to reach first, No. 8 hitter Jake Schellhammer came up and promptly smashed a two run homer over the left field fence to stretch Tamaqua's lead to 7-0. Ian Davis was up next and wasted little time adding another long drive, hitting the first pitch he saw out to left to give the home team an 8-0 advantage.The long ball kept working in the fourth, as Dante Agosti launched a 0-1 offering from Hazleton reliever Oliver Martinez over the right field wall to push Tamaqua's cushion to 9-0."We swung at some bad pitches last game," said VanBuskirk. "So we just tried to come out and focus on swinging at strikes and swinging at good pitches."And that's what we did today. For the most part, we swung at good pitches and that helped us put it in play."Tamaqua's pitchers gave up only three hits in the contest, and reliever Nate Wickersham punctuated the dominant performance by striking out the side in order to end the game.Tamaqua 143 100 - 9 10 0Hazleton 000 300 - 3 3 7W - VanBuskirk. L - Concepcion. HR: T - Schellhammer (3rd, one on), Davis (3rd, none on), Agosti (4th, none on).