Bright sunlight came through the windows of historic Rockne Hall on Saturday afternoon as Parkland and Allentown Central Catholic finished up their rare Eastern Pennsylvania Conference boys basketball matinee.
Perhaps the sun shining on the two teams was a harbinger of bright second halves of the season for the perennial area powers, who have combined for nine District 11 championships this decade.
On this day, the outlook was just a little sunnier for the Trojans, who posted a 54-49 win over the Vikings to snap a three-game losing streak.
Tyler Beck scored 19 points, and Jude Ruisch added 16 as Parkland improved to 7-4, 6-1 EPC while ACCHS dimmed to 8-4, 6-1.
The Trojans were coming off consecutive losses to St. Joe’s Prep, Penncrest, and Archbishop Carroll and didn’t score more than 47 points in any of those games.
Playing without TJ Lawrence and Javian Porter, Parkland continued to run hot and cold against Central. The Trojans scored just nine points in the first quarter and fell behind 16-9 before getting a pair of 3-pointers from Ruisch and four treys overall to move in front 27-26 at halftime.
They added four more 3-pointers in the third quarter in opening a 41-27 lead, but just when it looked like Parkland would put things away early, Central went on a 9-0 run to get within five.
However, the Vikings then went more than four minutes without scoring, and even though the Trojans didn’t have a field goal in the fourth quarter, they made enough free throws — 9 of 12 — to pull away.
“We were shooting good shots early, but they weren’t falling for us,” Trojans coach Eddie Ohlson said. “We trusted in each other to make the right plays and to make shots, and we did, and our defense fell in line. It was a good team win.”
Ohlson said he expected to get back Lawrence and Porter soon, and Parkland has a favorable schedule coming up. Four of their next five games are against teams with losing records. The exception is a Jan. 10 game at Central York, the District 3 power that beat Parkland in the Class 6A 2024 state finals. The Panthers routed Middletown 78-27 on Saturday to improve to 8-0.
“It’s a long season, and we’re trying to build and get better,” Ohlson said. “That’s why we try to play a tough nonleague schedule. There’s a lot of learning in losing, and we’re not dwelling on the three games we lost over the break. We’re learning from it, and the guys stayed positive. They’re doing a great job in practice. I like where we’re at.”
ACCHS began the season 2-2 and then won six in a row before losing to Pope John Paul II from Royersford, 39-38, on Tuesday in the finals of its own holiday tournament.
“We’re slowly putting the pieces together,: said Vikings coach Dennis Csensits. “From a player’s perspective and a coaching standpoint, we’re still trying to figure things out. We’ve had some stretches over the first month or six weeks of the season where we’ve played pretty well. And then we’ve had a couple of stretches like the first four minutes of the second half today where we were a little undisciplined and lost our assignments, and we let a four-point game get away from us a little bit.”
After they got back within 51-46, the Vikings had three turnovers and three missed shots to slow their momentum. A basket by former Parkland player Cameron Hines stopped the slide, but it was too late for the Vikings to get back in it.
Ruisch went 4-for-4 at the line in the final period as the Trojans improved to 40-71 all-time against the Vikings and improved to 6-7 against ACCHS this decade.
Beck and Ruisch each made four 3s, and Parkland had 10 as a team.
“It’s always good to get a win in EPC play,” Beck said. “The teams we played over the break were really good. We have to learn from those losses and come back stronger. We’re good right now, but we can get a lot better, and we’ve got guys coming back soon that will make us a lot better and deeper.”
Ruisch, one of several football players who took some time to get healthy and in sync, said his team talked at halftime about communicating more on defense.
“We had to get stops and knew that defense would lead to offense,” Ruisch said. “That helped us control the pace. This was big for us, especially being a league game. Javian and TJ coming back will be big for us. I feel good where we’re at. We’re on the rise, and we’re only going to get better.”
Parkland 54, Allentown CCHS 49
Parkland 9 – 18 – 18 – 9 — 54
ACCHS 10 – 15 – 11 – 13 — 49
PARKLAND (54)
Kearney 3 2-2 9, Adams 0 0-2 0, Nassry 2 5-8 10, Beck 7 1-2 19, Ruisch 4 4-4 16. Totals 16 12-18 54.
CENTRAL (49)
Schmell 3 0-0 8, Hines 6 4-6 17, Gonzales 5 1-2 11, Leak 1 0-0 2, Ford 4 0-0 11. Totals 19 5-8 49.
3-pointers: Parkland (10) Beck 4, Ruisch 4, Kearney, Nassry. ACCHS (6) Ford 3, Schmell 2, Hines.
Fouls: Parkland 12, CCHS 16.
Officials: Mike Pina, Dennis McWhite, Johnny Hymans.
Other Saturday games
Pocono Mountain West 70, Becahi 38: KJ Coles made seven 3-pointers and scored 31 points overall as the Panthers routed the visiting Golden Hawks. West, which improved to 9-1 overall, 6-1 EPC, also got 15 points from Teddy Stiehler. Roman Jackson led Becahi (5-7, 1-6) with 12.
Blue Mountain 65, Northampton 58: Tyeirre Meade scored 24 points, and Cohen Werner added 16 as the Eagles handed the Konkrete Kids just their second loss in 10 games. Noah Walakovits led Northampton with 26 points.
Northwestern Lehigh 59, Kutztown 45: The Tigers bounced back from Friday’s loss to Notre Dame-Green Pond with Mason Bollinger scoring 20 points and Malachi Coleman and Brady Krimmel adding nine apiece for the Tigers (8-4).
Bangor 60, Palisades 40: Jason Marcantonis scored 19 points, and Landon Childs added 16 as the Slaters improved to 4-5. Sha Schulbach led the Pirates (0-10) with 11.
Catty’s Eric Snyder gets win No. 400
The Rough Riders got 13 points from Caiden Weaver and 12 apiece from Frankie Pujols and Reece Lopez in a 61-30 rout of visiting Argyl to give veteran coach Eric Snyder his 400th career win. The 64-year-old Snyder, a 1979 Catty graduate, is in his 34th season. His overall record is 400-424. His current team has a record of 6-3.
