Belle Vernon, other semifinalist complete turnaround
After winning only eight games last season, the Belle Vernon boys basketball team has authored quite the turnaround story, making the WPIAL semifinals this year.
But these Leopards have copycats. The WPIAL semifinals are Monday through Wednesday and the final fours have a number of turnaround stories other than Belle Vernon. Teams that were below average last season — and a few who were downright bad — have done an about face and suddenly find themselves one win away from playing for a championship.
For example, imagine before the season if someone would’ve said this: “Either Laurel Highlands or Thomas Jefferson will play for the WPIAL Class 5A championship.”
What a knee slapper that would’ve been. But now it’s true. Either Laurel Highlands or Thomas Jefferson will be one of the teams in the WPIAL Class 5A title game.
“It’s nice to see some guys who have worked hard and have some good moments. Moments they’ll never forget,”
Laurel Highlands coach Rick Hauger said.
The turnaround stories are in various classifications:
• In Class 6A, Central Catholic was 5-17 last season. Now the Vikings, under first-year coach Brian Urso, are in the semifinals and play Mt. Lebanon in a doubleheader Wednesday at Robert Morris’ UPMC Events Center.
• In Class 5A, Laurel Highlands was 4-17 last season, but knocked off No. 1 seed Penn Hills in the quarterfinals. Laurel Highlands will play in the semifinals Tuesday for the first time since 1972. Coincidentally, in 1972 Laurel Highlands beat an undefeated team in the semifinals before more than 9,000 fans at the Civic Arena. That undefeated team was Penn Hills.
• Thomas Jefferson will play Laurel Highlands in the semifinals. Thomas Jefferson was 11-11 last year and 5-17 in 2017-18.
• Belle Vernon will play in the Class 4A semifinals one year after going 8-15 and allowing more points per game (69.6) than all but two teams in the entire WPIAL. Belle Vernon will play Wednesday against perennial power New Castle, which has won six WPIAL titles in eight years. Belle Vernon has made it to a title game once and it was 42 years ago.
• Also in Class 4A, Blackhawk is in the semifinals after going 10-14 last year. The Cougars will play Highlands Wednesday.
• In Class 3A, South Allegheny is one of the feel-good stories in the WPIAL this season. The Gladiators were 6-15 a year ago, but won a section title for only the second time in school history and will now play in the semifinals for the first time. South Allegheny plays North Catholic
Monday.
• Shenango is in the Class 2A semifinals a season after going 11-14. Shenango will play Sto-Rox Tuesday and Shenango will try to make it to the title game for only the second time in school history. The other was 1996.
So, while the NCAA has March Madness, this season has been the February Fury in the WPIAL. Besides Laurel Highlands beating a No. 1 seed, Central Catholic beat No. 2 Fox Chapel, Belle Vernon beat No. 3 Quaker Valley and Shenango beat No. 3 Jeannette.
Belle Vernon is led by longtime coach Joe Salvino, who coached Monessen for 34 years before coming over to Belle Vernon at the start of 2018-19.
“I thought at the end of last year, the kids started to finally adapt to what we were trying to do with them,” said Salvino, who has a 664-277 record. “I thought the experience would help coming into this year.”
Having players with another year of experience can certainly help. But the biggest factor in a turnaround often is simple — a team has more talent.
“I definitely believe we have more talent,” Salvino said. “Talent has a lot to do with it and I’ve never seen people win without it. Chuck Noll didn’t win all those Super Bowls with the Steelers because he didn’t have talent.”
Belle Vernon was helped when sophomore guard Devin Whitlock transferred from Monessen. Whitlock averaged 18 a game as a freshman last season at Monessen and averages 20 for the Leopards.
Laurel Highlands was helped with the addition of freshman point guard Rodney Gallagher, who averages 22.2 points a game.
“We have three seniors who started most of the time last year and got that experience,” Hauger said. “Then you bring into the picture Rodney, who is about as big of a difference maker as you can come up with.
“Some of these playoff runs are made by teams that maybe just got hot at the right time. For other teams, maybe they’re a little more talented, but flattened out. You just never know why. But that’s why we play the games.”