I have now entered that sort-of dull time before the start of baseball season when every evening is taken up by a night at the ballpark. We still have a few weeks but it is almost here. Almost. Weekly stop at Gift Horse on Monday.
Normally in the second round of the PIAA playoffs York runs into someone from the Philly Catholic League and that is it for them. I have had a problem since two of the teams that have bounced us in the past decade have had players that lived out of state. St. Joe’s Prep’s star player in 2013 was from New Jersey (didn’t actually know that until I heard someone on ESPN talking about him during a broadcast when he was in college) and Bonner-Prendergast’s two best players last year were from New Jersey and Delaware. Not a problem this year with York playing now in the western side of the bracket against WPIAL champ Mars but it doesn’t address the underlying issue. Oh yeah, York took on an entire planet but who’s keeping track? Just kidding and I am sure that joke has been used many times before.
Made the trip it Hollidaysburg to take in the game. Not the best trip to do during the work week but oh well. It is slightly closer than Altoona is but not by much. I saw Mars last year in the state title game and they did not impress, but they did make it to that point. They graduated PA’s Mr. Basketball but do not seem to have missed a beat losing only one game all year and that was to a team from California.
The game turned into a foul-a-palooza. Both teams were getting whistled in the first half and neither team could get a rhythm going with York leading at half. Mars had a player with 4 fouls and another with 3 at that point while York had several players with 3. The refs were probably locals and were not ready for this level of ball. There isn’t a lot of big time ball played in District 6, especially since State College, Mifflin County and Altoona play in the Mid-Penn. In the second half York got hit with most of the fouls and Mars woke up and began hitting some three pointers. Mars took the lead, York came back but Mars got back on top late. York’s post man fouled out late (on one of the many touch fouls that were getting called) and they just never had the oomph to get the lead back but they kept within striking distance and had a chance to tie at the end. Add in things like a York player making a steal and running right into the ref turning the ball back over and it just wasn’t happening. Mars hit their foul shots and won 60-59. This one hurts and I’m sure everyone will relive this one over and over and over since it was very winnable. Had they won it would have set up an even longer road trip to play Meadville on Friday. Oh, and once again, I’d rather let the kids decide the game on the court. I payed to watch the players play, not the refs blow their whistle.
Bishop McDevitt played Quaker Valley in the next game and this was all McDevitt. McDevitt won 79-47. I left at half. Dad drove and he made the rare call to leave a game at halftime. It was a 2 1/2 hour drive back. McDevitt gets Imhotep next, good luck!
With the disappointment fresh in the books I headed up to Reading to take in two 6A games at the Geigle missing out on the huge Facebook outage since there is no Internet connectivity in the Geigle. First up was William Allen against LaSalle College. LaSalle was in control of this game from the start when they could not miss from 3 though Allen made a run to get back into the game in the third quarter when the refs went whistle happy putting LaSalle in the double bonus with a minute left in the third. That was a close as they came and LaSalle recovered to win 70-57. Then came Harrisburg and Chester. This game was played on fast forward and if PA used a shot clock it would have been unnecessary for this game. Chester got up big in the first, Harrisburg had a monster second and the game was tied 41 all at half. Chester got up in the third and while Harrisburg kept it close they couldn’t get over the hump. In the waning moments it got away from Harrisburg and Chester wins 76-65.
The big score for me was that the person behind me left $16 laying below their seat. They left halfway through the fourth quarter so big score for me! That is the most money I ever found before and I can’t believe how many people walked by it without noticing it.
On Saturday I celebrated St. Patrick’s Day. Walked down to Gift Horse to take advantage of their cheap beer special. I bought a sixer of Guinness and sat down to watch Ireland and Wales play rugby. Good times. I don’t get to watch much rugby so if this becomes a yearly thing I’m OK with that. Granted this is a bonus year with the World Cup so I’ll get a few of those matches too on NBC. The funny thing (for me anyway) is this was played in Cardiff. Just over the Mason-Dixon Line down in Harford County, Maryland is a town called Cardiff. A few miles away is the town (and that is being generous) of Dublin. I doubt they have any sort of friendly rivalry riding on the match but that would be interesting. Wales won 25-7 in a dominating performance.
Now of course you are wondering why I didn’t watch it at one of the local breweries? I asked the one if they could and the response was not exactly enthusiastic. I don’t blame them, they had a music act scheduled. I also didn’t want to spend St. Patty’s Day walking around downtown to find one that had it on especially with the parade going on. I probably could have found one, there aren’t that many sporting events going on at noon but I didn’t want to miss it so I just stayed home. Guinness doesn’t phase me much either. I lalso ooked and looked for a beer from Wales, even venturing down to Baltimore to see if I could find one at my old stomping grounds and no such luck. So, it was all Irish beer for me. I’ll find Brains somewhere.
And on Sunday, I rested.
