District 1 Class 6A boys basketball: Conestoga tops Chester to earn bid to PIAA playoffs

TREDYYFRIN — The stakes were very high Tuesday night at Conestoga High School in the District 1 6A playback round between the host Pioneers and Chester boys basketball teams. The winner of the contest would head to the PIAA 6A playoffs, while the loser would see its season end.

Conestoga opened the game up in the second period, and behind a 23-point, nine-rebound performance from Cory Hogan, went on to down the game Clippers, 71-60. The Pioneers will now play the 9-10 game against the winner of the Central Bucks South-Pennsbury game which will be played Wednesday. The Clippers season comes to a close.

“Every rebound was a battle out there tonight,” Hogan said. “I knew it would be a physical game so I really tried to lock in and be physical. (Chester) plays really hard so we had to match that. The great thing about our team is that tonight I had 23 points, but the next game I might have two points.

“That is the way this team is. We really do not care who is the high scorer or anything like that. As long as we come out with the win, it is the only important thing. If we play together like we did tonight we can do well in states.”

Conestoga (20-8 overall) won for the 13th time in its last 14 games, and the 10th-seeded Pioneers shot a torrid 23-for-44 from the field against Chester. Rowan Miller added 17 points and Tygee Clark chipped in 13 points.

Conestoga opened the game up in the second period, taking a 31-26 lead at halftime. The 14th-seeded Clippers (16-9) stayed in the game largely due to the splendid play of forward Paul Lindsay, who had a game-high 29 points to go along with six rebounds.

Leading by five points heading to the third period, the Pioneers got started right away as Hogan scored in the first 10 seconds of the third period. Shane O’Brien drained one of his two three-pointers to give Conestoga a 36-26 lead early in the third.

Lindsay came right back to score in the paint for the Clippers, who shot 20-49 from the field for the game. It looked like the Pioneers were going to run away with the game after Hogan scored inside for a 44-33 lead with 2:37 to go in the third quarter. Conestoga was getting the ball inside to Hogan almost at will in the second half.

Lindsay came right back and scored from the baseline for Chester and at the end of three periods, the Pioneers’ lead was 52-40. Conestoga shot seven-for-12 from the field in the third period while the Clippers shot five-12 from the field in the third period.

“We opened the game up in the second period a little,” Miller said. “And we carried that momentum into the third period. We ran our offense well most of the game. This team had a lot of injuries early in the season but our coaches preached attitude and staying together. They have been preaching that the entire three years I have been here and we all play for each other.”

Chester played very hard and tried to get back in the game but the Clippers could never hit the big shot when they needed it. Miller drove the lane and scored to make it 60-48 with just 2:16 to play in the fourth period. Chester did not quit however. Lindsay scored off a Conestoga turnover to make it 62-55 with just 1:40 to play.

The Clippers had to gamble on defense at this point and Hogan got behind the Chester press to score a layup to make it 64-55 with 1:08 to play.

Lindsay then scored an old-fashioned three-point play to make it a 66-60 game with just 33.4 seconds to play. Then Tygee Clark was fouled and hit two free throws for an eight point lead, and the Chester comeback attempt fell short.

“We had a ton of injuries early in the season,” Conestoga coach Sean Forcine said. “We were 7-7 and there was tension. The kids decided to buy in and fight and fight and come together and now we have won 13 of 14 games.

“This win puts a nice stamp on the season especially after we lost to Spring-Ford last week. We are not done yet. We feel we can make some noise in states and if we play tougher we can do that.”

Chester is a very young team with a bright future.

“We just had some mental mistakes tonight and some bad unforced turnovers,” said Clippers’ head coach Keith Taylor. “But this is a great group. They believed in what we were telling them all season and they did some things they thought they could not do early in the season.

“They were a very hard working group and they played very hard every game just like they did tonight.”

Conestoga 71, Chester 60

CHESTER – Harris 1 6-7 8, Demby 1 1-2 4, Lindsay 12 3-3 29, Bostick 0 0-0 0, Davis 2 2-2 6, George 2 0-0 4, Clayton 1 0-0 3, Mallory-Granberry 1 3-4 6, Bynum-Stokes 0 0-0 0. Totals 20 15-18 60.

CONESTOGA – Clark 2 9-12 13, Hogan 8 5-6 23, Mani 0 0-0 0, Miller 7 3-5 17, O’Brien 4 1-2 11, Tummala 0 2-2 2, Onwubuariri 2 0-0 5. Totals 23 20-27 71.

Chester 12 14 14 20 – 60

Conestoga 11 20 19 19 – 71

Three-point goals: Demby, Lindsay 2, Clayton, Mallory-Granberry, Hogan 2, O’Brien 2, Onwubuariri.