PW defeated Pocono Mountain West, advancing to Sunday’s PIAA 6A quarterfinal game against Reading High School at Temple University.
#1-3 PLYMOUTH WHITEMARSH 66, #11-1 POCONO MOUNTAIN WEST 63
BETHLEHEM – Ish Horn said he just ‘felt it.’
The Colonials’ junior guard certainly made it look easy enough when he unleashed a shot from midcourt that fell through the net at the buzzer ending the third quarter to send PW into the final quarter with a 55-50 lead.
“I just felt the shot,” Horn said. “I knew exactly where I was, and I knew where I was shooting it from. I tried to get the foul too. “
Horn’s buzzer beater was one of several huge plays in a 28-17 third-quarter tear by the Colonials, who turned a six-point halftime deficit into a five-point lead.
Senior Matt Walker got the assist on Horn’s backbreaker after a Panther miss on the defensive end.
“That changes the game,” Walker said. “It just boosted us. It kept the momentum going.
“Honestly, I didn’t even know there was that little time left. You get lucky – St. Patty’s Day.”
The Colonials created their own luck in a third quarter that altered the course of the game. Midway through the quarter, Walker hit a pair of clutch threes on back-to-back possessions after the Panthers opened up a 39-31 lead. His second pulled the Colonials to within five.
“We just believed in each other, got pumped up,” said Walker of his team’s second half effort. “We were confident, we were locking down on ‘D,’ and we picked up the intensity.”
The Panthers went back on top by seven, but Ahmad Williams buried a pair at the foul line, and when Cheo Houston scored on a floater in the paint, the Colonials trailed by just three. After a Panther miss, Houston – despite being fouled – scored on an impossible shot in transition. He completed the three-point play to knot the score 46-46.
Jalen Vaughns scored at the other end, but in another pivotal sequence, Williams and the Panthers’ Lance Singh were assessed a double technical, forcing Singh to take a seat on the bench with his fifth foul with 1:06 remaining in the third quarter. Things were never the same for either team.
Horn’s buzzer beater capped a dazzling 16-4 Colonial run in the final three minutes of the quarter.
“Confidence – it brought us up another gear,” Horn said.
Lost in the shuffle of PW’s big play offense was the team’s pressure defense that created problems for the Panthers.
“That’s what we rely on – our defense,” Horn said. ““We try not to wait for our offense to wake up, but we rely on our defense. We know our defense is going to be there, but the offense – you gotta pick it up fast.”
The Panthers pulled to within one after Vaughns buried one-of-two at the foul line early in the fourth quarter, but Houston found Horn cutting to the basket for an easy deuce, and after an Alan Gardner block at the defensive end, Horn connected on a pair at the foul line to put the Colonials on top 59-54. A three-point play by Horn with 3:42 remaining upped the Colonials lead to 62-55.
The Panthers battled back gamely, pulling to within two (62-60) with 1:41 remaining after Wiggins banked home a tough shot on a drive. Glover sank one-of-two at the foul line to make it a three-point game, and that score stood until Wiggins sank a pair at the charity stripe with five seconds remaining. Horn answered with two foul shots at the other end.
A Colonial win was all but assured, and when it was over, coach Jim Donofrio pointed to an intangible that was a difference maker in the second half.
“I’ve been so logical with them at practice, x’s and o’s and grind it out, almost puritanical,” the Colonials’ coach said. “You save the emotional part for this part of the year.
“Halftime was not even a marker on the board. It was, ‘You understand – this is for each other now.’ It really is right out of the emotional book right now. Do you want to go home? They’re a confident, tough bunch of kids. We go up against the Romans, the Imoteps and the Chesters and the Lower Merions. When we need to, we have a sixth or seventh or eighth gear, and there’s a reason for that. We have gears you haven’t seen.”
Horn led the Colonials with 20 points – 18 in the second half.
“I told him – ‘You can’t play in this game. You’re not ready for this game,’” Donofrio said. “That’s why I sat him down.
“He has a really beautiful soft side, and he has a really tough side. He decided to bring the soft side. I said, ‘All the assistant coaches want you in the game, but I don’t believe you can play in this game,’ and then somebody got in foul trouble, and I had to put him in.
“Ish Horn has to know he’s a talented kid and get after it. You set him loose. You don’t get this far in the season without having talent – 95 percent of this is talent, and if the talent is not sure of itself, it’s the coach’s job to reassure that it is. He was terrific. I just get out of the way.”
“I was so frustrated the whole first half,” Horn said. “(Coach Donofrio) said I was playing on my soft side. I was very frustrated. You just have to be confident. These games test you mentally.”
Williams – whose 11 points kept PW close in the first half – finished with 15, and Houston had 13. Glover contributed nine and Walker had seven.
Three players – all 1,000-point scorers – accounted for all of the Panthers’ points. Wiggins led all scorers with 28 points, singlehandedly keeping his team in it with 20 second-half points. Vaughns had 16 points and 10 rebounds in a monster first half that saw the Panthers opened up a 33-27 halftime lead. He finished with 24 points. Singh added 11.
“When you have a team that has three thousand-point scorers and Vaughns, who is just a man out there playing with boys, you can’t sit back because he’ll drop 40 points on you, so let’s go get it where it starts,” Donofrio said. “We have the ability to go 10 deep and do all that in a very disciplined fashion. We have no idea how far this is going to go, but it’s not going to go with us laying back.
“All the teams now know all their plays, they all know what their strategies are. It comes down to how much are you capable of giving literally every possession.”
Plymouth Whitemarsh (25-5, 14-0 SOL) will face District 3’s third place team, Reading High School, on Sunday. The quarterfinal game is tentatively scheduled to be held at Temple University at 2 p.m.
“It’s all or nothing – all or nothing every time,” Horn said.
“Every game is crazy,” Walker said. “It’s more and more exciting every time.”
Pocono Mountain West 16-17-17-13 63
Plymouth Whitemarsh 8-19-28-11 66
Pocono Mountain West (63) – Jalen Vaughns 10 4-8 24; Isaiah Wiggins 10 5-8 28; Lance Singh 4 3-4 11; Totals 24 12-20 63.
Plymouth Whitemarsh (66) – Ish Horn 6 7-7 20; Kareen Breedan 1 0-0 2; Matt Walker 2 1-2 7; Cheo Houston 6 1-3 13; Ahmad Williams 6 2-5 15; Alan Glover 3 3-4 9; Totals 24 14-21 66.
3-point field goals: Isaiah Wiggins 3, Matt Walker 2, Ahmad Williams, Ish Horn.
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