Early deficit too much for Highlands girls to overcome in 1st PIAA playoff game

By: Michael Love
Saturday, March 11, 2023 | 7:03 PM

The Highlands girls basketball team dug itself an early hole in a PIAA Class 4A first-round playoff game Saturday against District 6 champion Penn Cambria at Mt. Aloysius.

The Golden Rams, playing in the program’s first tournament, fought their way back from a 15-point deficit in the second quarter and trailed by a single possession with six minutes left in the fourth quarter.

However, the Panthers made enough plays down the stretch to finish off a 50-42 victory.

“I think they were a little nervous to start the game, being in the state playoffs for the first time and thinking maybe it was bigger than it was,” Highlands coach Shawn Bennis said.

“With their style, they play a matchup zone, so our girls, when they play against the zone, tend to think they have to play a certain way, and it does change their mindset. It’s more of a man concept than a zone concept. They think it’s a zone so they were sitting instead of attacking and still reading the defense and what it was giving us.

“We adjusted to that in the second half. We have to make field goals in order to pressure them. We thought coming in that if we could pressure them, we could get points off turnovers which, obviously, we did to get back in the game. If we executed offensively early on, I think the outcome might have been different. But give (Penn Cambria) credit. They were prepared, and they executed defensively and offensively.”

Penn Cambria (13-12) advances to the second round and will face District 10 champion Fairview on Wednesday at a site and time to be determined.

Fairview defeated Beaver Area on Saturday in a low-scoring affair, 26-23.

“Coming in, our record was .500, but we play in a tough league,” Penn Cambria coach Keith Saleme said. “With playing in that tough league, I know we can play with any team in the state. Any given night, we just have to come out and outwork the teams. Today, we were fortunate in that we made a few more shots, and we made our free throws down the stretch. That was the difference in the game.”

Panthers senior Abby Crossman, who led all scorers with 24 points, hit a jumper a minute into the fourth quarter to give Penn Cambria a 10-point lead at 36-26.

Golden Rams junior sharpshooter Kate Myers hit a 3-pointer 20 seconds later, and fellow junior Jocelyn Bielak added a two-point jumper off a turnover.

Myers, who hit five 3-pointers in the game, tallied 10 points in the fourth and finished with a team-best 16.

Highlands forced a second Penn Cambria turnover a few seconds later, and junior Kalleigh Nerone was fouled and sank two free throws to cut the deficit to 36-33 with 6 minutes, 12 seconds on the fourth-quarter clock.

Nerone collected 11 of her 13 points in the second half.

Myers hit the second of her three 3-pointers in the fourth quarter with 3:56 left to make it 40-36. But Penn Cambria came back with a Crossman three-point play 12 seconds later to put the Panthers back up by seven.

The Panthers were put on the line down the stretch, and they finished the fourth quarter 8 of 13.

“This is a senior-oriented team, and they’ve been through this throughout their careers,” Saleme said. “I expected that, and that’s why I didn’t call a timeout. Highlands cut it to three and had the momentum, and we responded. We came down and made a bucket and a free throw after that. I called a timeout, and I told the girls that’s how you have to respond. And they did their job.”

Highlands senior Ava Nitowski closed out her varsity career a little sooner than she had hoped. She picked up her fifth foul with 3:48 left in the fourth.

Bielak, who finished with nine points, was whistled for her fifth foul at the 3:02 mark, putting another dent in the Golden Rams’ late comeback hopes.

“We only go 6 or 7 deep, and the starters play a majority of the minutes,” Bennis said. “Losing Ava and Jocelyn, offensively and defensively, definitely hurt us.”

Highlands struggled to hang onto the ball early on and also take advantage of the scoring opportunities they were afforded by the Penn Cambria defense.

A 3-pointer from Myers with 4:21 left in the first quarter was the only points for the Golden Rams through the first 11 and a half minutes of play.

Crossman paced the Panthers with seven first-quarter points, including a 3-pointer as they opened a 14-3 lead after the first eight minutes.

“The focus early on was to get up on them which allows us to play a little more freely, go gamble, maybe go steal the basketball,” Saleme said. “That set up the whole tone of the game. It allowed us to dig our heels in a little bit and get after them in the press and gamble a little more.”

A free throw from senior Emily Hite and a 3-pointer from junior Kaylee Harpster early in the second extended Penn Cambria’s lead to 15 at 18-3.

That is when Highlands started to chip away at the deficit.

Bielak connected on back-to-back jumpers, and after senior Ashley Galovich hit a jumper for the Panthers, sophomore Tyarah Woody and Nerone hit buckets for the Golden Rams to close the gap to nine at 20-11. That was the score as the teams headed to the half.

Highlands hoped to bounce back from losses to North Catholic and Quaker Valley in the WPIAL semifinals and third-place consolation, respectively, but the loss caps the Golden Rams’ season at 16-10.

“They showed so much heart,” Bennis said. “The one thing we’ve talked about is their mental toughness. It showed this afternoon that they were mentally tough. To be down 18-3, yes, they could’ve easily have given in, but they believed in each other.”

Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.

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