Rams’ rally comes up short
Pennride edged by Roman
SPRINGFIELD » The Pennridge boys basketball team entered the fourth quarter with Roman Catholic trailing by 11. The Rams, however were not going to back down.
“I think in a lot of cases with teams that are down 11 against Roman in the fourth quarter, I just told the boys, end up losing by 25,” Pennridge coach Dean Behrens said. “We made a run at them.”
The Rams scored the first eight points of the fourth to pull within 49-46 after a Tyrese Lewis free throw with 5:16 remaining. But Roman responded with the next seven and the Philadelphia Catholic League champs held on late to edge Pennridge 58-56 in the PIAA Class 6A first round Saturday night at Cardinal O’Hara.
“I wish we had a little more time of the clock,” Behrens said. “(Hakim) Hart was lights out, we zoned a lot. I didn’t think maybe they’d shoot that quite that well, you were hoping they weren’t going to shoot quite that well. Listen, Hart’s a good shooter I knew that going in. You kind of roll the dice, kind of make them shoot from the cheap seats and hope maybe they have an off night. They didn’t.”
Hart provided most of the Cahillites offense in the first half, scoring 17 of Roman’s 30 points before the break. Hart finished with a gamehigh 22 points, collecting five critical points in the fourth to help Roman advance and face Plymouth Whitemarsh – a 71-47 winner of Dallastown – in the state second round Wednesday at a site and time to be determined.
Jon Post paced District 1 No. 5 Pennridge with 18 points – 12 in the second half – while Sean Yoder added 10 points as the Rams, making their first PIAA appearance since 2015, end the season at 19-9.
“You never know who’s going to win the game. Two teams come on the court it’s a 50/50 chance. That’s how we looked at it,” Post said. “We didn’t care who they were, what their reputation is. Everyone in this gym probably thought ‘Oh, they’re going to come out with a win.’ We didn’t care about that. We wanted to show everyone else in here that we could. And that’s the attitude we came in and we showed we wanted to do it.”
Lynn Greer III finished with 16 points for Roman (20-6) while Seth Lundy scored 13 of his 15 in the third quarter.
The Cahillites, District 12’s second seed, led 49-38 at the start of the fourth but Jake Pestrak knocked down a 3-pointer and Yoder drove for two to make it 49-43. Post cut the margin to four when he scored inside while Lewis’ free throw had the Rams
within 49-46.
Roman snapped the 8-0 run when Lundy found John Kelly inside for a basket. Hart came up a steal and took it in for a breakaway slam. Hart followed with a 3-pointer from the wing, pushing the Cahillites’ lead to 56-46.
Consecutive 3s from Mike Molettiere pulled the Rams within 56-52. Two misses on 1-and-1s by Roman in the final minute kept Pennridge’s comeback hopes alive with a Lewis putback making it 5654 with 18.2 seconds left.
Greer III was fouled as Roman attempted to inbounds and hit both ends of a 1-and-1 at 18.2 for a four-point lead After Yoder missed on a 3 Post scored inside with 0.8 seconds. Roman inbounded to Lundy to run out the clock and collect the win.
A Hart 3-pointer gave the Cahillites a 10-4 lead in the first quarter before the Rams went on a 9-0 run to go up 1310 on Ryan Warner’s corner 3.
Threes from Hart and Greer III put Roman back up 16-13 but a Pestrak corner triple before the buzzer had the score level 16-16 after eight minutes.
Pennridge took a 22-20 lead on a Warner drive but with Lewis picking up a third foul and Post called for two, Roman ended the half with a 10-2 run to lead 30-24.
A Lundy 3 and a Greer III basket had Roman up 35-24 early in the third. Two Lundy free throws at 5:30 gave the PCL champs their largest least at 39-26.
The Rams chipped their deficit down to eight twice but Lundy’s putback at the buzzer had Roman leading 49-38 heading to the fourth.