Boys hoops: Golden Panthers rally falls short in district semifinal

Second chances don't often happen in sports, and even less so in the postseason. The Pope John Paul II boys basketball team got one on Wednesday night, but it wasn't enough.

In a game that was much closer than the final score would indicate, the Golden Panthers overcame a first half in which they committed nine turnovers and shot just 24 percent from the field before finally succumbing to District 1AAA top seed Octorara, 53-40.

After allowing Octorara to stampede to an 8-0 start, the PAC-10 champion Golden Panthers trailed 23-13 at the end of the first half, which was plagued by uncharacteristically poor shot selection.

“I think we let the adrenaline of the chance to play for a district title get to us a bit in the first half,” said Jacob Gribb. “We settled in and got back to our game in the second half. This is what it's about, playing for a chance to get into states. That was our goal all year.”

“We were fortunate to still be in the game at halftime,” said head coach Jack Flanagan. “These guys have played with heart and determination all year and tonight was no exception. We talked at halftime about getting to the basket, and getting ourselves back into the flow of the game and we were able to have success.” 

Following the intermission, it took just four minutes for the Golden Panthers to erase most of the damage that the Braves had done to the school's district championship hopes. The Golden Panthers scored nine unanswered points to climb to within one of Octorara. 

With 3:47 left in the third, Paul Mills snagged a rebound of Charles Cooper errant put back to give the Golden Panthers possession and a chance to take their first lead of the contest, but a three point attempt by David Cotellese clanked off the iron.

The Golden Panthers had four opportunities in the second half to grab the lead but were unable to convert their chances, as the Braves continued to push the ball up court and feed it inside to their big men, fueling a 12-6 run to close out the third quarter.

“We took our shots too fast in the early going,” said Jeff Evans, who hit a key three pointer to cut the Octorara lead to 43-40 with a minute and a half to play in regulation.

“We have gotten off to slow starts a lot this year," said Evans, who finished with a team high 11 points. “We have come back all year, so we just had to get back to our game and let our defense set the pace of the game. We had a couple of big stops and were right there at the end.”

Gribb, who hit an eight footer to cut the Octorara lead to two at 37-35 with seven minutes remaining, had a shot that appeared to be in but rattled back out with the Golden Panthers trailing 43-37.

Evans would follow Gribb's near miss with a big 3-pointer on the Golden Panthers ensuing trip down the court. Had Gribb's shot been good, Evans's bomb would have tied the game with 1:30 left.

“Man, I thought it was in,” said Gribb. “That sucked when it came back out. Then Jeff hit one that would have tied it. We just didn’t get it done after that.”

After battling back to within two on several occasions in the late stages, PJP2 could only watch the Braves, who were 14-of-16 from the line overall, close out the game by converting eight straight foul shots, six by Charles Coooper.

“We had open shots but they were from 25 feet, we needed to make that one extra pass and get it closer and I don’t think we did that well tonight. We will get to work tomorrow and get ready for Saturday, when it’s all on the line,” said Flanagan.

“We just couldn’t get over the hump,” added Flanagan. “As cliché as its sounds, we just needed to get over the hump and take the lead. Sometimes that can flip the entire game in your direction and we just couldn’t get that one break. Saturday we are playing for the prize, not a consolation. I equate the districts to a league tournament like the Atlantic 10. States are our NCAA tournament, and we set that as a goal all year. We have got to be ready to play 32 minutes on Saturday. Every team at this level is very good and there is no room for error.”

Pope John Paul II will hit the hardwood at Plymouth Whitemarsh High School on Saturday at 2:30 pm with Bishop Shananan standing in the way of a berth in the PIAA State tournament.

Pope John Paul II (40) – Cotellese 2 0-0 5, Evans 4 0-0 11, Gribb 5 0-1 10, Mills 2 0-0 4, Malescio 1 0-1 2, Mansur 3 0-0 6, Stinson 0 0-0 0, Taylor 1 0-0 2.

Totals 18 0-2 40.

Octorara (53) – Clark 4 2-2 10, Cooper 2 10-10 14, Kasabo 3 0-0 6, Navarro 1 0-0 2, Newton 4 0-1 8, Brown 4 2-3 10, Bowers 1 0-0 3. Totals 19 14-16 53.

Pope John Paul II                  5   8  15 12 – 40

Octorara                              12 11 12 18 – 53

3-point field goals: Evans 3 , Cotellese, Bowers