‘Old-school’ style benefits Penn Hills

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette going back to my college days, it’s always kind of been that way. I’m all about percentages, so I look at it as shooting 50 percent from 2 is a lot easier than shooting 38 or 36 percent from 3, which is almost equivalent to each other… that’s kind of the math part of it.”

The style of play, though, largely keeps players from one of the flashier moments in the game of basketball — sinking a 3-pointer.

It’s a process to convince players to stick to the outline, DeRose said.

“For the most part. If the kids still had their way, they’d want to be standing behind that arc chucking it up, because they think that’s exciting, showing people you can shoot. I get that, but it’s not going to work for everybody.

“It takes a lot of breaking it down and building it back up. I’ve had to say ‘ Here’s your shooting percentage from 2, here’s your percentage from 3. Why the heck would you want to be shooting from 3?’”

For Fulton, the strategy eventually made sense.

“It took me a little while because I like to shoot 3’s, but once I bought in, it’s been great,” Fulton said. “We had a lot of talks about percentages.”

Penn Hills started off the season 14-0, eventually earning a No. 5 seed after falling to section rival Woodland Hills, 66-56, on Feb. 6. After taking down No. 1 seed Mt. Lebanon in the semifinals and winning the title, the Indians will face Fox Chapel, which lost to Pine-Richland in the quarterfinals, 4:30 p.m. Saturday at North Hills.

The Indians split two games with the Foxes in the regular season, winning, 4736, Dec. 22, and losing, 61-54, Jan. 26.

“I think the approach is the same and they’re kind of similar of what we’ve seen. They’re a very good team and obviously they were hot down the stretch,” DeRose said.