Mother Nature plays a role in everything.

For the Lehigh Valley Legion baseball season, she is forcing teams and coaches into tricky predicaments.

Donnie Rehrig and his Carbon Monarchs didn’t seem to feel the effects on Wednesday night, as they handled Northern Valley in an 11-1 five-inning victory. The game, which is at the tail end of the regular season for all LVL teams, proved to play a substantial role in both teams’ postseason hopes.

The Monarchs, who entered the game with a 7-7 record, lit up the scoreboard for nine runs in the bottom of the fifth to put themselves in a stronger position.

Northern Valley, which came in at 6-6, now has a slightly more uphill battle in its remaining contests.

With the win, Rehrig’s Monarchs go into tonight’s final regular season home game against Coplay with a two-game win streak and plenty of confidence.

“We have been sort of up and down all season,” Rehrig said postgame. “We need to continue to improve and play better, and the kids have responded. We won two in a row, and with Coplay our last regular season game (tonight), hopefully we can come out and beat them again, finish 9-7, and let the chips fall where they may.”

Against Northern Valley, Drew Frank pitched a four-hitter, and Brad Buzzard’s bat led the offense for the winners to help them remain in solid positioning for their postseason hopes.

“Drew pitched a nice game today, and he’s really been coming around and turning into our No. 3 pitcher,” Rehrig said. “Hopefully, with this win, we can continue to build on that with our next game, and build some more momentum going into the playoffs.”

Buzzard finished 2-for-2 at the plate with a triple, three runs scored, two RBIs and also stole three bases and maneuvered two walks.

James Lordi went 2-for-4 with a run, while Mike Bozilesky was 1-for-2 with a run scored, an RBI, a walk and two stolen bases.

On the other side, Northern Valley saw Colten Hagadus go 2-for-2 with his team’s only run scored, while Ryan King brought in that run on a sacrifice fly.

Luke Eitner and Daulton Lorrah added individual hits to round out the team’s output.

“Everyone has had their issues this season with the weather and limited rosters,” Northern’s head coach Brad Rauch said. “We have yet to have our whole team this season and unfortunately, we don’t have the Holmes brothers (Derek and Justin), and they’re a big part of our team’s success. The last two games, we’ve been outscored 27-3, and we’re not a power-hitting team to begin with.

The guys have been doing a great job filling in, but our confidence just isn’t where it could be with those guys in the lineup.”

Northern Valley has three games remaining on their slate with North Parkland tonight and a doubleheader at Emmaus tomorrow.

Despite the loss, Rock knows anything is possible.

“We played a lot of games this year with nine or 10 guys, so to be 6-7 in this league, where your three, four, five and six teams are just beating the crap out of each other, we’re really not in a bad spot,” Rauch said.

Northern Valley 001 00 - 1 4 0

Carbon Monarchs 101 09 - 11 8 0

Eitner, Lucykanish (5) and Rudolph; Frank and Taras. W - Frank. L - Eitner.