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By Andrew Robinson

For a player like AJ Hoggard, the balance between taking over a game and starting to do too much is often razor-thin.The Archbishop Carroll sophomore has been working all season to hone that instinct and use his wealth of skills to best help the Patriots when they need it. Friday night in the second half, Hoggard toed the line perfectly, seizing the moment in the fourth quarter to rally his team past Archbishop Wood.

Hoggard scored 23 points as Caroll topped Wood for the second time this week, claiming a 69-62 win in their PCL quarterfinal matchup.

“I felt like the second half had to be mine,” Hoggard said. “I had to get my team over the hump. I wasn’t going out again like we did last year, especially on our home court. I was going to do what I had to do for us to win.”

The winningest senior class in Wood history needed to get one more win to keep its season alive, but couldn’t quite muster enough big shots down the stretch to do so. Wood shook off a slow start and battled back to take a lead into the half, with Julius Phillips and Andrew Funk carrying the load on offense.

(click on this link for the full story)

 

By Neil Geoghegan

When head coach John Goodman emerged from the locker room following Downingtown East’s historically significant 51-31 triumph over visiting Penn Wood in the first round of the District 1 Class 6A Basketball Playoffs he was soaked.“We wet him up,” acknowledged Malik Slay, the Cougars star guard. “We had all the Gatorade bottles filled with water. As soon as he walked in, we got him.”

For the first time in program history, Downingtown East celebrated a district playoff victory on Friday. And perhaps even more impressive than the win was how the Cougars did it.

“For people outside our program, this may just be a playoff win,” Goodman said. “But for us, it’s a breakthrough. We’ve been fighting for six years just to put ourselves in a position like this, so to be able to get it done – without three of our top four scorers – is special.”

Regular starters Andrew King (ankle injury) and Corey Hernandez (flu) missed the game. And to complicate an already troubling situation, a third starter — Tariq Kalim — took a hard fall and injured his back early in the second period and never returned.

(click on this link for the full story)

By Matt Smith

There wasn’t much Cade Brennan could do but observe from his seat on the bench. Gripping his water bottle, the Garnet Valley junior glanced at the scoreboard … over and over.

The clock was winding down on Garnet Valley’s season. Brennan wanted to be on the floor and, quite frankly, the Jaguars needed him out there if they had any chance at survival.

It wasn’t his fault, though. Brennan, the team’s leading rebounder in Friday’s district playoff opener, was pulled in favor of a lineup conducive to hitting shots. Garnet Valley, the No. 9 seed, was trailing by four points to 24thseeded Downingtown West late in regulation. The Jags needed their shooters — Austin Laughlin, Cole Palis, Connor O’Brien, whomever. Brennan, a junior power forward, isn’t a player known for his ability to hit the 3-ball.

“It was tough,” Brennan said. “We had to get a couple of 3s, so obviously, we had to have our shooters out there.”

What transpired was a se-

quence that put the nail in the Jags’ season. The Whippets hauled in four offensive rebounds during a possession that lasted nearly three minutes. In the process they knocked down several free throws — 9 of 13 in the quarter — to come away with a 49-40 victory over the Jags. D-West (1211) travels to No. 8 Upper Darby for a second-round contest Tuesday.

Brennan eventually checked back into the game. But it was too little, too late for Garnet Valley (16-8).

The Whippets’ two big guys, forwards Greg Barton and Will Howard, accounted for the four offensive rebounds in the waning minutes. Maybe, if Brennan is in the game, the Jags get the ball back with enough time to rally.

“We had a great season and the seniors had a really good year,” Brennan said. “I’m proud of them. It’s a tough way to lose, but we’ll be all right and come back next year.”

(click on this link for the full story)

By Rick O’Brien

Behind spark plug and dynamic scorer Tyler Norwood, Penncrest advanced to Tuesday night’s Central League boys’ basketball final.

But the Lions’ quest for their first league crown since 2010 fell short when Lower Merion’s Steve Payne sank a right-side runner high off the glass with 2.6 seconds remaining, giving the Aces a thrilling 48-46 triumph at Harriton and their second straight title.

“Getting here for the first time in my high school career was great but not winning it really hurts,” Norwood said. “It stings, no doubt.”

An excellent penetrator with a solid pull-up jump shot, Norwood finished with a game-high 19 points, four rebounds, two assists, and a steal. He accounted for seven of his squad’s nine fourth-quarter points.

Lower Merion used a box-and-one on Norwood most of the way, with 5-foot-11 guard Darryl Taylor shadowing the 5-9, 165-pound senior.

“They did the same thing they did the first time we played them,” Norwood said of the Aces’ 67-59 home win on Jan. 12. “We prepare for that and me being double- and triple-teamed in practice all the time.”

(click on this link for the full story)

 

By CoBL Staff

After St. Joe’s Prep beat Bishop McDevitt and Cardinal O’Hara beat Archbishop Ryan in the two play-in games on Wednesday, the final eight teams for the Philadelphia Catholic League playoffs are set. Friday’s games carry not only an opportunity to advance to the Palestra for the PCL semifinals, but hold state implications as well.

Here’s a look at each of the four:

1) Bonner-Prendergast vs. 9) Cardinal O’Hara
This matchup is arguably the most intriguing of the quarterfinal games due to the fact that both of these teams have made tremendous strides since last season. O’Hara didn’t win a game in the PCL a year ago, and hadn’t won a playoff game since 2012 before beating Archbishop Ryan on Wednesday night. Last season, Bonner had to win a play-in game to get the quarterfinals before a 22-point loss to Archbishop Wood, the league’s eventual champion. This year the Friars lost just one league game, a 61-50 loss to LaSalle on Jan. 24. Bonner and O’Hara met in the final game of the regular season on Sunday; the Lions led for a good part of the contest, but the Friars pulled out a 67-63 win to clinch the top seed.

Bonner boasts three all-Catholic League players, including junior guard Isaiah Wong, who took home the league’s MVP award after averaging 22.2 points per game. Senior forward Ajiri Johnson and junior forward Tariq Ingraham also received league honors and sure up the interior for Bonner on the offensive and defensive end. For O’hara, it all starts with senior point guard Antwuan Butler, an Austin Peay commit and first team all-league selection who averaged 18.5 points per game. Sophomore Jordan Hall is dangerous too, with two 20-point games in PCL play.

(click on this link for all four game previews)

By PAPrepLive

Christian Ray and Gavin Burke were hot early as The Haverford School rolled past the Solebury School, 89-56, in the opening round of the PAISAA tournament. The victory earned the Fords (21-5) a quarterfinal date with Penn Charter at 2 Saturday afternoon. The sixth-seeded Quakers knocked off No. 11 Friends’ Central, 63-55.

Ray scored 15 of his 19 points in the first half and Burke nailed all three of his 3-point field goals in the first 16 minutes to help the Fords open up a 45-31 lead. Burke finished with 15 points, while Kharon Randolph pitched in with 10. The Fords made 13 3-point field goals in the game.

By Matthew DeGeorge

Elijah Smith was busy making noise on the offensive end in the first quarter Wednesday night, busy outscoring Archbishop Ryan by his lonesome over the first eight minutes of a first round Catholic League encounter.But the Cardinal O’Hara guard knew that if the Lions were going to meet their objectives on the day, they would have to bring the energy on the other end of the court. One textbook close-out, and one clang off the Ryan rims at a time, Smith and his teammates delivered.

O’Hara blanketed Ryan into a putrid shooting night, the No. 9 seed stealing away from the Northeast with a 58-47 upset over the eight-seeded Raiders, O’Hara’s first Catholic League playoff win since 2011-12.

The win earns O’Hara (11-11) a neighborhood showdown with top-seeded Bonner & Prendergast Friday. The Friars edged O’Hara, 67-63, just four days ago.

The defensive end is where O’Hara made its money. Their dogged defensive effort, which started with a stifling 2-3 zone, held Ryan to a woeful 2-for-21 from 3-point line. Ryan was just 19-for-59 (32.2 percent) from the field. And the 7-for-14 effort at the line — including 1-for-7 to start the fourth — was the accumulation of frustration that would boil over closer to the game’s conclusion.

(click on this link for the full story)

 

By Matthew DeGeorge

 In a back hallway at Harriton High School Tuesday night, two players met and embraced, one wet from a celebratory dousing of ice water, the other’s face stained with tears.In a tit-for-tat fourth quarter, those two players seemed intent on deciding a Central League championship by whomever had his hands on the ball last.

Steve Payne did.

The Lower Merion guard hit a runner high off the glass with 2.6 seconds left, one possession after Penncrest’s Tyler Norwood had tied the game in similarly spectacular fashion, as the Aces earned a 48-46 win for their second consecutive Central League championship.

The battle for a crown ultimately came down to the two stars, who led the way offensively. Norwood paced all scorers with 19 points, Payne with 18. Of the 20 points scored in the fourth quarter Tuesday, 15 were provided by the duo. From the time Harrison Klevan hit a 3-pointer to put Lower Merion up 43-39 with 4:39 left, the rest was up to Norwood and Payne’s personal game of one-on-one.

(click on this link for the full story)

Webmaster’s note: The Lower Merion vs Penncrest game was our Game-of-the-Week and can be heard on our Archives link by clicking on the player below.

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By Matt Smith

Garnet Valley has walked around with a target on its back for a long time. The team to beat in the Central League had won four consecutive league titles and had lost only one game to a conference foe since the beginning of the 2015-16 campaign.

Springfield was tired of seeing Garnet Valley win and wanted to do something about it. The Cougars believed it was their time.

It’s not a coincidence that a Ky McNichol-led Springfield team was the last to defeat Garnet Valley. You have to go back to Dec. 22, 2015, when McNichol was in her second year coaching the Cougars. In her rookie season she won six games. The next season, within its first month, McNichol was the coach responsible for ending Garnet Valley’s then-38-game winning streak in the Central League.

Could the Cougars do it again Tuesday night at Harriton, with the Central League title at stake? You bet.

(click on this link for the full story)

Webmaster’s note: The Garnet Valley vs Springfield game was our Game-of-the-Week and can be heard on our Archives link by clicking on the player below.

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By Josh Verlin

When Lower Merion won the Central League championship a year ago, there was no need for any heroics, as the Aces took home a 22-point victory over Strath Haven in a game which was basically over midway through the third quarter.

Defending the title was not nearly so easy.

The league’s regular-season champion, Penncrest gave Lower Merion all it could handle on Tuesday night, in a game that was tied at the end of the second and third quarters, and tied with 30 seconds left after the Lions’ star senior Tyler Norwood finished a tough bucket in the lane.

But Lower Merion was not to be denied.

Junior guard Steve Payne’s drive to the hoop with under three seconds left proved to be the difference-maker, as the Aces came away with a 48-46 victory.

It’s the fifth Central League championship in the last seven years for Lower Merion (20-4), which has won 14 titles in 28 seasons under Gregg Downer.

(click on this link for the full story)

Webmaster’s note: The Lower Merion vs Penncrest game was our Game-of-the-Week and can be heard on our Archives link by clicking on the player below.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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