finals
of the LL @ Hershey Giant Center 2/16/07 McCaskey 86 Lanc Cath 57 Points LC Unofficial stats. McCaskey Sidelines…Good to
see Mike Gross courtside. He is the “veteran” of LL coverage.
Having covered LL during the “bowie” era.…Harold Z likes
to archive section of the LL. Wondered if the game was the highest scoring
winning total in LL history? …Poor crowd for various reasons. Might
be time to go back to the LL gyms for the finals…McCaskey continues
to dominate LL play in the 2000 by winning 4 LL titles and losing 2. That’s
6 in the finals out of 7 years..Not bad at all. The “Duke”
of the LL (or for some of our UNC fans might say the Heels). ..Coach Paul
Blackburn of Lebanon gave out all def play plaques and coach of the year
awards at half time. The coaches association presented them. Congrats
to those winners. http://www.llhoops.com/Alldef2007.html.... A nice job
on the refs part last night (Mike Kauufauld, Tim Groff, and Rick Dissinger)....The
“first round of district 3 starts Tues. Check papers for times and
district three site for brackets.Next up for Mccaskey is Warwcik and for
the Crusaders- LS.. ..McCaskey joins Lebanon HS as the only three peat
winner during the LL. With the nucleus intact for next year, we might
be writing about a quad winner in 2008. Check out game picts from Dave Porter at http://www.pbase.com/tornadoalleyhoops ~Dell Jackson 2nd round of the LL @ CV 2/14/07 McCaskey 67 Lebanon 58 The ice and snow messed up the schedule for Wed. and caused some shifting
for Thursdays games too. Boys games were moved up to 6:00. McCaskey came
out strong in the third for another shot at the championship trophy. This
reporter was late so…we get the 1/2 feature game . Lebanon Sidelines...Jason G. reminded
this reporter to be on time for the next game..A decent crowd at CV considering
the temp, ice and snow and game shift....Neat new scoreboard at CV...good
seeing CVCoach Bob Borden working the game...all sorts of parking guys
outside during the 15 degree temps. Wow!...Finals
are Friday at the Giant Center. Mccaskey vs Lanc. Cath --yet again :) ~Dell Jackson 1st round of the LL @ Penn Manor 2/12/07 Solanco 75 LS 59 ~ Dell Jackson
The crowd was sparse (1900), the temperature was cold (15 degrees), the
game was on cable, and a few of the LL teams were in action last night.
The atmosphere was not of championship basketball in February, but a championship
game we had. McCaskey ran out to a third straight title by, well, running.
Sometimes a game is summed up on one play and this might have been the
case as a thunderous follow-up dunk by Lamar Patterson at the end of the
half gave McCaskey a 35-28 lead and the momentum that would carry over
for the entire second half.
LC’s Eric Spence, showing that he should be considered for some
post season accolades, scored 7 points inn the first quarter to keep the
Crusaders within striking distance. McCaskey countered with 5 players
scoring as they got out to a 17-13 lead. The Crusaders mixed in some zone
but McCaskey hit some jays and had some follow-ups as the Tornado increased
the lead.
LC settled down a bit and McCaskey went cold in the second. The Crusaders
took a brief lead at 18-17 on a layup by David Rudy. McCaskey countered
with a three ball by Franklyn Thomas to put them up 25-21. Catholic came
back again. Post move by Matt Balasavage, a jumper by Cullen Farrell,
and one of 2 from the line by Balasavage had the Crusaders up 2827 with
2:26 on the clock. Then came Lamar Patterson time. Patterson is a 6’5”
200 lbs plus gazel. He started the sequence off by hitting Jerren Harris
with a pin -point pass for a layup. Next he got a rebound on one end and
then followed up a miss for a layup himself. Next possession he gets another
def board which ultimately leads to a Thomas layup and finally has the
ESPN play of the night on a thunder dunk off a miss at :01 of the first
half. Ouch.
McCaskey had a huge third quarter vs Lebanon HS Thursday evening and the
repeated the pattern Friday night. A 10-2 run in the beginning of the
third doomed the Crusaders. A Harris jumper, a Thomas layup, another jumper
by Thomas, a runner by Thomas and a foul shot by Patterson pretty much
put the game out of reach for LC. The quarter ended at 62-44, and basically
the game was over.
McCaskey continued its running in the fourth as they outscored LC by 24-13.
Dudie Hunter controled the ball as he did throughout the evening. Both
teams emptied the bench towards the end of the game as both coaches allowed
players to play on the big court at the Giant Center.
McCaskey
Dudie Hunter 14
Jerren Harris 19
Lamar Patterson 12
Franklyn Thomas 19
Eric Spence – 29
Keith Sweigart - 13
Turn - overs
9
LC
13
Reb
McCaskey
24
LC
21
Quotables..Coach Powell
of McCaskey..”things worked out well…We have a good bench
and our guys practice for their minutes. That makes us better in the long
run…It will be tough replacing “Dudie” next year, but
we’ll pick up the pieces and do what we have to do for next season…We
wanted to win but not get too worried about three straight. I mean if
we lose Wed our season is over..We’ll think more about what we did
this season after our season is over…I don’t think about the
3 straight. We know what’s waiting for us in district play…whatever
happened tonight it was not our last game. We must understand that if
we lose Wed it will be over. We have to pick it up next week. “
Spoken like a coach who’s been there and done that before and keeps
his eye on the big picture. Congrats to McCaskey and Coach Powell.
At half McCaskey was up by 1 although they needed to come back to take
the lead. The Lebanon Cedars came out in various zone defenses (2-3, 1-3-1,
1-3-1 trap) to try to have McCaskey adjust. Adjust they did, as the Tornado
always seemed to make the extra pass to slice and dice the Cedars zones.
When they did not go inside, they bombed away from the three line- making
three triples in the period. Junior off guard, Franklyn Thomas was on
fire for the quarter. He started it off with a three ball and finished
the quarter with a lay-up. In between?… a jumper and 2 more threes
for 13 points in the pivotal quarter for McCaskey. Even when the Tornado
missed, they seemed to gather every rebound. Jerren Harris and Lamar Patterson
were huge on both ends of the floor. In fact, they held an 11-4 edge for
the quarter. The 21-10 spread for the quarter doomed the Cedars.
Lebanon cut the lead to 7 at 55-48 in the middle of the 4th on the strength
of inside drives by Anthony Rivera and a lay-up by all-section and possibly
all- league performer Anthony Trautman. The Cedars continued to play hard
and to try to apply pressure but McCaskey usually broke through on outstanding
handle by senior point, Anthony Hunter. McCaskey made some plays, and
Lebanon could not cut into the lead enough to make the Tornado sweat too
much.
2nd half stats
TO
Lebanon 5
McCaskey 5
Rebounds
Mccaskey 19 Lebanon 14.
Total Points
McCaskey
Jerren Harris- 19
Lamar Patterson – 10
Franklyn Thomas 20
Anthony Rivera 13
Tyler Spancake 12
Anthony Trautman 22
Quotables…Coach Powell
of McCaskey..” Our kids get up to play great tradition schools.
Lebanon is one of them. ..I think we are self- motivated to play well.
.. ..I told them at half we would play better in the second half….We
are very unselfish…. We had too many weapons for them to keep us
down the entire game.” 
Solanco’s power game vs. LS’s perimeter game. Early on the
perimeter game won out but in the end, Solanco’s power game proved
way too much for the LS Pioneers. LS jumped out early, only to see Solanco
close the gap and tie it up at the end of the half. Solanco moves on and
LS waits till next week to enter District play vs. Lanc. Cath.
With both team coming out in a man defense, the first quarter was an entertaining
affair. The teams were going up and down the floor but not scoring too
much early. It was 5-5 with 6:00 left in the first when LS’s ALL
LL candidate, Zac Shaeffer, took over for the Pioneers. Back to back three
balls had the Mules calling time out to talk about how to guard Shaeffer
with 1:42 to go and the Pioneers up 18-9. The quarter ended at 19-11.
Solanco tightened up the 'd' in the second as Shaeffer got few looks and
few attempts at the basket. The Mules started to pound away at the smaller
team. A mini run of 6-0 in the middle of the 2nd had LS calling timeout.
The Mules were running on lay-ups by Lamar Brandon and Nate Kreider, LS
hung in there and had a 30-25 lead with 1:00 on the clock compliments
of a Shaeffer three ball. However, the Mules kept pounding away, going
to the foul line, and getting the Pioneers in deep foul trouble. A 5-zip
run tied the game at the break and a bucket at the buzzer... One felt
the momentum switch over to the Mules.
The first half had LS holding its own on the boards with a 15-21 deficit.
Turnovers for the half had LS with 7 and Solanco with 4.
The second half went pretty much like the end of the first. Solanco scored
the first 4 points on inside plays, and LS countered with threes’.
LS took it's last lead at 42-41 with 2:30 left in the third. A 10-1 run
salted the game away for the Mules. Shaeffer hit a three ball to start
the 4th as the score was 51-46 but that was as close as it would get.
Nate Swarr of the Mules had an excellent floor game for the Solanco as
he controlled the offensive end with drives and dishes. Mule inside strength
provided by Lamar Brandon, Brian Allport, and Henry
Glackin proved way too much for LS as the big guys kept pounding the glass
and scoring from the post. The Mules dominated the glass in the second
half and finished with a 44-30 spread on the boards. In the end Solanco
broke the LS pressure, spread the floor, made some fouls and moved on
in the LL playoffs.
Points
LS
Zac Shaeffer – 30
Andrew Risser -11
Solanco
Lamar Brandon – 15
Nate Kreider – 18
Nate Swarr – 13
Sidelines..good crowd at
PM..2 of the best student sections in LS and Solanco with each having
a turn to holler for good plays. …thanks to long time PM scorer
Joe Herman for the point totals…good to see Harold Z of the Lancaster
News.. ..lots of camera action on the floor. ..LLhoops.com will be posting
the next day…Solanco moves on to play Lan, Cath in the next round.
..Everywhere we go folks tell us they love the LL history. ..Some good
stuff there…... 3 man crew for the refs, which we will see the rest
of the way...on the road to Hershey- round one..All Section winners won
in the first round of the LL tonight.
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