Third-quarter run sparks OLSH win
Championship season keeps going; Chargers match girls team’s title
“To be down only two at halftime, I was very happy thinking that we usually jump on teams in the third quarter, and they jumped on us instead.”
Our Lady of the Sacred Heart was on the doorstep of winning its first WPIAL championship the past two seasons.
Friday, the Chargers charged right over it.
OLSH broke open a close game against second-seeded Serra Catholic by going on a huge run to start the third quarter and the top-seeded Chargers rolled to a 65-46 win in the Class 2A final at Petersen Events Center.
“Two years we came up short, but this year our chemistry was different,” said OLSH point guard Dante Spadafora. “We’re a brotherhood. We believed in each other and got the job done.”
OLSH, the runner-up in 2017 and 2018, led by two points at the half before going on a 15-0 run to begin the third quarter, giving the Chargers (22-2) a 42-25 lead with 4:15 left in the quarter. Serra (20-4) got no closer than 11 points thereafter.
“Actually, there was no inspired speech,” OLSH coach Mike Rodriguez said. “I told the guys I liked where we were at. My exact words were, ‘We’re going to be fine. I like where we’re at right now. Let’s go out there and have fun.’ “
The Chargers went out and had a blast, partly because of a defensive change that saw OLSH begin to employ a 1-2-2 trap. It forced Serra into turnovers that led to several OLSH layups. Daren DiMichele scored the first eight points of the third quarter and finished with a team-high 16.
Four other OLSH players scored at least nine points. Spadafora and Austin Wigley had 13, Ricco Tate 10, and Jake DiMichele nine.
“To be down only two at halftime, I was very happy thinking that we usually jump on teams in the third quarter, and they jumped on us instead,” Serra coach Justin Walther said.
Turnovers were a problem all game for Serra. The Eagles, who were trying to win their second title, turned the ball over 21 times. OLSH had only seven turnovers.
— Serra Catholic coach Justin Walther
That turnover discrepancy helped negate Serra’s 51-29 rebounding advantage.
“When you play good teams like we did today, you can’t turn the ball over like this. We paid for it,” said Walther, whose team had won 19 of their previous 20 games.
Serra’s Jimmy Moon, a 6-foot-9 senior forward and the WPIAL’s third-leading scorer, accounted for more than half his team’s points, pouring in 25 to go along with 15 rebounds. Chris Salemi finished with 10 points and 11 rebounds, but the rest of the Eagles combined to score only 11. It was their lowest point total of the season.
The win continued what has been a memorable school year so far for OLSH athletics. A day earlier, the OLSH girls won their first WPIAL title. OLSH is just the 16th school to capture boys and girls titles in the same year. The school’s football team won a WPIAL title last fall, making this just the 17th time in WPIAL history a school has won football and boys basketball titles in the same school year. Wigley, Tate and Tyler Bradley, all whom scored Friday, were stars on the football team.
“I think winning the football championship started setting the tone for us and gave us the belief that we could do it, too,” Rodriguez said.
Winning a WPIAL title is especially meaningful to brothers Daren and Jake DiMichele, whose father, Daren, and cousin, Adam, led Sto-Rox to WPIAL and PIAA titles.
The younger Daren said this doesn’t give him family bragging rights. Well, not for the time being, at least.
“It’s cool,” DiMichele said. “My dad and my cousin won WPIAL championships. But they won state championships, so that’s what I want, too.
“We enjoy being WPIAL champions, but I want to be a state champion, too.”