Bulldogs get by Reading for title
The last shot went up with sixtenths of a second remaining and the game still in the balance.
The basketball ended up in the hands of Stevie Mitchell.
So fitting.
The Wilson junior made one amazing play after the other in Saturday’s District 3 Class 6A championship game at Giant Center, and he made the final one, securing the Bulldogs’ taut 58-56 victory over Reading High.
“I knew I wasn’t gonna let anybody get it other than me,” Mitchell said of rebounding Rene Rodriguez’s free throw, one the Red Knights guard intentionally missed in order to give third-seeded Reading High one last chance.
The Red Knights (18-8), stomped on by the Bulldogs (27-1) three times already, were not about to go down without their best effort.
They pushed the state-ranked Bulldogs to the max, pressing them all over the floor and turning their 111th meeting into a classic. It was perhaps the best – and no doubt the most important – in their heated 75year rivalry.
That only made Wilson’s first district championship all the more rewarding.
“This is something you dream of as a kid,” said Wilson senior Avanti Lockhart. “It’s a dream come true.”
The top-seeded Bulldogs were up 14 after Evin Timochenko put back a miss to open the second half. The Red Knights found another gear after that and showed they’re a different team than the one that lost to Wilson by double-digits three times earlier.
They pushed and pushed, took the lead twice in the final quarter, and kept it a onepossession game for the final seven minutes.
The harder they pushed, the more resolved Mitchell got.
The fourth quarter was pure and simple Stevie Time. The Berks Player of the Year was relentless, scoring 15 of his game-high 27 points over the final 6 ½ minutes. He had 11 of Wilson’s final 13 points, further cementing his All-State resume.
“I was not gonna lose that game,” he insisted. “I was gonna do whatever it took. It was definitely a time for me to step up.”
When Timochenko, the 6-6 center who had 18 points and 10 rebounds, fouled out with 1:59 left and the Bulldogs up just one, their 20game winning streak was in jeopardy.
The Red Knights were feeling it at that point; they scored 38 points in the secondhalf against Wilson, a total most teams only manage over four quarters. Still, the irrepressible Mitchell would not be denied. He answered every time the Red Knights scored.
Reading sophomore Joey Chapman scored with 1:59 left, with 1:26 left and with 11 seconds left, each time trimming Wilson’s lead to a point.
Each time Mitchell responded to keep Wilson ahead.