Lincoln Park survives late rally

Leopards hold off Sharon in 3A semis

Things were unraveling for Lincoln Park. Some questionable shots, turnovers and suddenly a 19-point second-half lead against Sharon was down to three midway through the fourth quarter.

Lincoln Park’s Isaiah Smith could feel his team was shaken, so he got into his favorite spot in the left corner and stopped the run himself when he calmly swished a 3pointer.

Then with a little over a minute left in the game and Lincoln Park holding only a four-point lead, Smith again got to his favorite spot in the left corner. As seemingly everyone on Lincoln Park’s side was saying “no” when Smith let go with another 3-pointer, Smith said “yes” when the ball rattled in.

Smith’s 3-point shots were the daggers late in the game as Lincoln Park held off a furious Sharon rally for a 67-58 win in a PIAA Class 3A semifinal at New Castle High School.

Lincoln Park (25-4) will play Saturday afternoon in Hershey for the championship

against Trinity of Camp Hill. It will be Lincoln Park’s fifth championship appearance in nine seasons. The Leopards can give a big thank you to Smith, who transferred from Sewickley Academy last June.

“That corner is his spot. When he takes a shot from there, I’m pretty confident,” Lincoln Park coach Mike Bariski said. “My three assistants hated the first 3pointer. They’re going, ‘no, no, no,’” and I said, ‘Don’t worry about it.’”

Bariski also didn’t mind the other 3-pointer with a little more than a minute left.

“That’s what we do, shoot 3’s,” Bariski said.

Smith finished with 20 points, making 6 of 12 3-point shots.

“I hesitated a little to take the one 3-pointer, but not really because I knew we needed a big one,” Smith said. “We had been taking a lot of bad shots and not getting it inside the lane. But we came through.”

Another Lincoln Park player who came through was Andre Wilder, a 6-foot-2 junior forward who had 28 points. Wilder did damage on the inside with strength but also stepped outside and made all three of his 3-point attempts. It continued an impressive playoff run for Wilder. He was averaging only 10 points, but since 6-6 junior center Tanner Mathos was injured (foot) in the WPIAL championship, Wilder has averaged 18.4 points. Mathos has not played since that game.

Wilder scored some of his points while being guarded by Sharon’s Ethan Porterfield, a 6-8 senior who had 23 points and is the school’s alltime leading scorer.

Sharon (24-5) is the District 10 champion that made it to the PIAA Class 4A final last year before dropping down in classification. The Tigers fell behind by 50-31 late in the third, but an 18-2 run had the large Sharon student section on its feet in the fourth. Then Smith silenced them — twice.

“I was confident in my shot all night,” Smith said, “so I just kept shooting it.”