Senior Night had proven to be an easy night for Cedar Crest, and early in the fourth quarter of Tuesday’s regular-season-ending 67-44 romp over McCaskey, coach Tommy Smith afforded each of his seniors a curtain call.
Fernando Marquez, the team’s leading scorer, was the first to exit the game, to embraces and adulation. Then it was Alex Abreu, normally part of the Falcons’ deep bench, but a starter on this occasion.
Then Leo Tirado. And Owen Chernich. And, finally, Aiden Schomp. This quintet has been joined at the hip for quite some time. As Chernich put it, “We’ve been playing together since we started playing. Third grade, we were on a travel team, all together – all the seniors.”
But even as they were marching toward a second straight Section One title this season, the Falcons seemed to be coming apart at the seams. Exactly one week before the rout of the Red Tornado, they themselves were on the wrong end of a 65-40 non-league loss at Lampeter-Strasburg. That was the last game in a 3-3 stretch that included another one-sided defeat, an 80-57 verdict against Central Dauphin.
Smith said “a little bit” of soul-searching was required after the L-S debacle.
“The one thing that I’ve realized is that things are never as bad as you think they are, and they’re never as good as you think they are,” he said. “The big thing we needed to do was refocus the kids, their mental state.”
In particular Smith said his guys needed to buckle down on defense, which he called “the backbone of this program.”
But it wasn’t just that, according to Marquez.
“We just kind of felt like we weren’t having fun,” he said. “And we just had to have a talk and just have some more fun.”
At the same time, they needed to be more dialed in to start games, as was particularly evident in that L-S loss. The Falcons, who start the 6-6 Schomp and 6-7 junior R.J. Young, enjoyed a considerable size advantage over the Pioneers, but missed one point-blank attempt after another in the early going, leaving them in a hole that only grew deeper as the night wore on.
“We knew that we had to be ready to go,” Chernich said, “right from the tip.”
They batted all those issues around at practice, the day after the L-S loss. The day after that, they beat Manheim Township to secure the section. Two days after that, they drubbed Conrad Weiser. And then they scored the night’s first 20 points en route to the runaway victory over McCaskey.
That leaves them 16-5 heading into the league playoffs, which they open Monday at home against Section Three runner-up Octorara.
Granted, the last three victories came over sub-.500 teams. But there has been a sigh of relief nonetheless.
“I feel much better,” Smith said following the McCaskey game.
“We knew we had the talent,” Chernich said. “We played a lot lower than what we should have been playing. That (rough patch) was kind of like a reality check for us, knowing that we’re not as good as we think we are every night.”
Certainly, though, they are blessed with experience, depth and balance. Marquez, an IUP football recruit, is Crest’s only double-figure scorer, at 14 points a night, but the Falcons have five guys averaging between 6 and 8 points per game (Young, Schomp, Tirado, Chernich and backup guard Danny Speaks).
“Fernando can score on anyone at any given time,” Smith said, “but he doesn’t have to do it, and that’s a nice thing, because I’m putting five guys on the court who can score.”
As mentioned, Smith also makes liberal use of his bench, the better to preserve his players’ legs and play the sort of defense he emphasizes. All that, combined with a deep well of experience – Marquez, Chernich and Schomp are all three-year starters, and Tirado has seen extensive action over that stretch – allowed the Falcons to burst out of the gate this season. Their first two league games were blowouts of Hempfield and Penn Manor, and they rode that, uh, crest for several weeks.
Then came the aforementioned reality check. Now, however, they appear to be back where they hope to be. Now they once again appear to be who they thought they were.
The playoffs are always fraught with peril – “Everyone’s good,” Smith said – but Cedar Crest would like to believe it is in it for the long haul.
“It’s about taking care of ourselves and preparing ourselves to move forward,” the coach said.
As has been made abundantly clear in recent weeks.
“I like us against anybody, when we’re playing our best,” Chernich said. “We’ve just got to keep this momentum going.”
And remain connected, same as they almost always have been.
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