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By Matt Smith

The Christian Academy’s entire offensive strategy revolves around its G-foot-3 senior center.

Head coach Jason Wilt doesn’t try to make it a secret. For the Crusaders to have success, Amber Bullard has to touch the ball as often as possible in the low post. Teams such as High Point Baptist Academy can try to dou- blc-and triple-team her until the cows come home, but that approach fails when the players doing the defending are significantly smaller than Bullard.

And that’s when you get games like Saturday.

Bullard dominated with 30 points, 24 rebounds and four blocked shots to lead District 1 champion TCA to a 55-33 win in the first round of the 1*1 A A Class A tournament. It is TCA’s first victory in the PIAA playoffs since 2018.

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By Terry Toohey

Yassir Joyner did not hesitate.

The 6-3 senior guard saw the ball bounce right to him with time dwindling down in the second overtime Saturday, with Upper Darby deadlocked with Bethlehem Liberty in the opening round of the PIAA Class 6A playoffs.

Joyner grabbed the ball and put a soft shot off the glass with his left hand. The ball bounced on the rim a few times before finally falling through the hoop just before the horn went off to give the Royals a stunning 66-64 victory over the District 11 runnerup Hurricanes.

“I just took advantage of it,” Joyner said later by phone. “I saw an opening; nobody was there, so I laid it up.”

Joyner’s bucket capped a wild back-and-forth battle between the Royals and Hurricanes and sends Upper Darby (19-8), the sixth seed out of District 1, into Wednesday’s second round against District 3 champion Reading at a site and time to be determined. The Red Knights (28-1) rolled over Haverford, 74-43.

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By Andrew Heller

Playing in his final game for Reading High at the Geigle, senior Myles Grey made sure to go out with a bang.

The 5-11 All-Berks guard was electric as he tied his career high with 30 points and made eight 3-pointers to lead the Red Knights to a 74-43 win over Haverford in a PIAA Gass 6Aboys basketball first- round game Saturday afternoon.

“It feels great,” Grey said, “especially with this being my last game here, to pack it up on a performance like that, I can look back and be proud. It’s definitely something that Pm proud of.”

With the win, Reading High earns another 32 minutes of basketball and will take on Upper Darby, winch defeated Bethlehem Liberty 66-64, in the second round on Wednesday, time and site to be announced.

For Red Knights (28-1) coach Rick Perez, Grey’s lights-out performance is the culmination of an unrivaled work ethic.

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Sophomore guard Talasi Henderson and senior Aamir Murray each scored 14 points and Kyree Latimer and Tymir Brown-Smalls added 11 points each as Constitution High of Philadelphia held off Delco Christian, 63-53, in a PIAA Class 2A state playoff opener on Saturday at Bensalem High.

Cole Pruessner led all scorers with 16 points while junior shooting guard Josiah Gaines had 14 for the Knights.

Delco Christian (14-13) trailed by only two at the half, 31-29. But the Generals (18-8) stretched the lead to nine after three quarters via some solid shooting from the line, and held serve the rest of the way.

Constitution, the District 12 top seed for Class 2A, moves on to play the winner of District 11 champ Mahonoy Area and District 4’s Northwest.

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By Rob Parent

To learn how to be a successful girls basketball team on the big stages takes time and lessons learned.

Friday night was one of those lessons.

Cardinal O’Hara took advantage of a third-quarter lapse by Conestoga to build a lead and the Lions held on to post a 50-42 victory in the opening round of the PIAA Class 6A tournament at Archbishop Carroll.

The Lions (21-5), the District 12 champions, advance to the second round where they will face Spring-Ford at a time and place to be determined on Tuesday. The Pioneers, the 11th seed out of District 1, ended their season at 21-7.

“I thought we grinded it out,” O’Hara coach Chrissie Doogan said. “We knew Conestoga was much improved. They have a couple of real good players. We wanted to use our transition to get us going. I feel we came out of halftime real strong.”

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By Dennis Weller

After allowing 17 points in the first quarter, the Cardinal O’Hara Lions knew they had to do better than that the rest of the way Friday night at Fleetwood. They increased their defensive intensity in the second quarter, forcing seven Tiger turnovers, and went on an extended run at the end of the half that proved to be decisive in a 62-50 win in the opening round of the PIAA Class 6A Tournament.

Izaiah Pasha scored 23 and Pearse McGuinn 17 for O’Hara (18-8), which will face the winner of Saturday’s game between Allentown Central Catholic and E&S Carver in the second round on Tuesday. Aiden Soumas scored 20 and Jake Karnish 19 for the Tigers (22-5), who were making their first state appearance since 1990.

“We came out really flat defensively,” said Pasha. “We gave up 17 points. We picked up our defense after the first quarter. We wanted to keep them under 10.”

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