Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
D-East holds off D-West in tight finish
UWCHLAN » This late in the regular season, every game, every possession could alter the race for a league title or district playoff seeding.
Thursday night at Downingtown East, the Cougars and Downingtown West played 32 minutes of frenetic basketball, and although Whippets senior center Greg Barton had a 28 point, 12 rebound game, the Cougars, behind the smooth play of point guard Malik Slay and some good inside play from Tariq Kalim, held on for a thrilling 48-44 Ches-Mont League National Division win that kept the Cougars in a tie with Coatesville for second place behind front running Bishop Shanahan.
West (4-3 Ches-Mont, 7-7 overall) outscored the Cougars (5-2, 8-5) by nine points in the second half and got within two of the front-running Cougars late in the fourth period. The Whippets held Downingtown East without a made field goal in the fourth quarter as all seven points in the frame came from the free throw line for the Cougars.
“We really did not panic and we had the lead so they had to chase us,” Slay said. “I had some quality drives to the basket but they did not go in and I knew they did not have anybody that could stay in front of me, so I went to the hole and got fouled and we made free throws. We really wanted this win
because they beat us the first time this season and we felt we should have won that game. West has a good team but we showed we are a good team too. We work really hard and it paid off tonight. We got stops when we had to.”
With Downingtown East up 28-15 at the half and the Whippets shooting a cold six for 20 in the first half, it looked like the Cougars would sail to the victory. East shot 11 for 22 in the first half and had much the better of the play. But West came out and went on an 8-0 run to start the third period behind the seven inside points from Barton. The Whippets finally got the ball down low to Barton, who used his 6-foot-8 size and inside moves to score 25 of his game high 28 points in the second half.
But, East rebounded late in the period behind a long 3-pointer from Kalim and an inside bucket from Andrew King, who had 13 points for the Cougars before fouling out early in the fourth quarter to maintain a 41-29 advantage after three frames.
West outscored the Cougars, 15-7, in the final frame, and looked like it was going to blow right by the home team behind the stellar play of Barton and Will Howard, who tallied 11 points to go along with seven rebounds. When Barton took a nice feed from Davis Reardon to score inside it was a 41-39 East lead and Cougar coach John Goodman called a timeout with 1:54 to play and East looking very much like a team that was hanging on for dear life.
“We were playing with the lead and sometimes it is tough to play with a lead and do the things you did to get the lead,” Goodman said. “We had too many quick possessions and Greg Barton and Will Howard work really well inside together, and they pinned us down low. Give credit to them. They did a great job but we came through when we had to.”
Slay saved the Cougars’ bacon as he hit five of six free throws down the stretch, and the Whippets could never get the big shot to fall. Davis Reardon, Howard and Evan Kaiser all missed 3-pointers in the final minute that derailed the valiant Whippet comeback. West only shot four for 14 in the final period and one for six in the final two minutes of play.
Barton threw down a slam along the baseline with 3.2 seconds left to draw the Whippets within two at 4644, but Corey Hernandez was fouled on the inbound play and drained both free throws, clinching the Cougars a very big league win.
West now faces an uphill climb to qualify for the Ches-Mont Final Four.
“Greg really dominated tonight, Downingtown West coach Stu Ross said. “He finally did the things to dominate a basketball game that I knew he could do. We just fell a little short.”