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District 1 5A: Norwood, Penncrest break 37-year district dry spell

03/04/2017, 5:30pm EST
By Josh Verlin

Tyler Norwood (above) had 26 points as Penncrest won its first district title since 1980. (Photo: Mark Jordan/CoBL)

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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VILLANOVA -- Facing down a double-digit deficit to Upper Merion in the third quarter of the District 1 5A championship game, Penncrest was left with one option in hopes of a comeback: give Tyler Norwood the ball, and let him do his thing.

And on the biggest stage of his young career, the Lions’ junior delivered.

Norwood connected on a quartet of 3-pointers over the closing 16 minutes, each one seemingly from a foot further than the one before it, as Penncrest captured its first district title since 1980 with a 39-37 win over Upper Merion at Villanova’s Pavilion on Saturday afternoon.

The super-confident 5-foot-10 guard finished with 26 points, good for two-thirds of his team’s scoring total, including 18 of Penncrest’s 24 in the second half.

“Unbelievable, first championship in 37 years,” he said afterwards. “I give a lot of credit to coach [Mike Doyle] he keeps us in it, plays he calls, I mean, he’s one of the best coaches I’ve ever had, I give a lot of credit to him.”

“It’s probably the greatest basketball moment of my life,” said Doyle, a Philadelphia University (then Textile) alum who spent 10 years as an assistant under Phil Martelli and has also had coaching stops at Arcadia and two other high schools. “Twenty-five years coaching, playing for Herb [Magee], coaching with Phil, this was unbelievable.”

Penncrest (20-7) only had three players score; fellow seniors Justin Ross (8 points, 2-2 3PT) and Mike Mallon (5 points, 6 rebounds) were the only other two to put the ball through the net.

As usual, it was defense which won the game.

The Lions, who don’t have a starter taller than the 6-3 Mallon faced down a Vikings squad that featured three starters 6-6 or taller in seniors Matt Faw (6-8), Ethan Miller and Anthony Sheppard.

“They were as big as we’ve seen all year,” Doyle said. “Not just big, but big and athletic, like above-the-rim.”

And though Faw, bound for Holy Cross in the fall, finished with 14 rebounds to go along with nine points and a trio of big-time blocks -- Miller added nine points, six rebounds and three blocks -- Penncrest never really let the size differential bother it.

Mallon, Chris Mills and Manny Ruffin all played terrific interior defense for Penncrest, limiting Upper Merion to 14-of-38 (.368) from the floor; the Vikings also shot themselves in the foot by going 5-of-13 from the foul line.

“You can’t find better defense anywhere with Mills and Manny and Mike,” Doyle said. “We had a couple of bullets in our holster as far as our 1-3-1 halfcourt [press] and our (double-teams) and just waited on them, waited on them until it was time to spring them.”

Both teams will continue on in the state 5A bracket, two of seven District 1 5A teams to qualify. Penncrest draws the 10th seed out of District 3, Hershey; Upper Merion gets placed in the western half of the bracket, where it gets the fifth seed out of District 3 (Greencastle-Antrim) in the first round.

Upper Merion’s best offense came in the form of senior guard Andrew Persaud, who knocked down four 3-pointers of his own to finish with a team-high 12 points. His third and fourth of the afternoon helped his team go up 30-20 midway through the third quarter before Penncrest’s push started.

The Lions, trailing by seven entering the fourth, almost immediately cut that to one (32-31) within the first 100 seconds of the final period, on a pair of Norwood 3s. The first he knocked down as he fell over; the second, from beyond the college arc, came from straightaway.

Upper Merion re-extended the advantage to six with 2:45 to play, before Norwood struck again.

First came a baseline jumper to make it a four-point game, then his deepest shot of the night, a 3-pointer from just right of straightaway to make it a one-point game with 78 seconds left.

“That’s his M.O.,” Doyle said. “It’s reminiscent of [Allen] Iverson, once he gets it going, it’s like watch out. You can keep him down for a quarter, you can keep him down for two quarters; you can’t keep him down the whole game.”

The jump-shots only started working after Upper Merion had a block party for the first part of the fourth quarter; Faw and Miller each had multiple blocks on Penncrest drives as the Lions began the comeback.

But it ended up working into the Lions' plans.

"We had to take the ball to the basket to make them at least respect our inside game, so that’s why it was okay if they were blocking shots," Doyle said. "We wanted to go to the basket to keep them honest and then we’ll be able to knock something down from outside.”

Norwood also provided the game’s winning points, two foul shots with 41 seconds to play after one of Upper Merion’s 10 turnovers.

Penncrest still had to survive one final Upper Merion turnover with eight seconds left and then, after a missed 1-and-1 by Mills, forced a missed jumper from Faw with three ticks left.

Mallon knocked down one solitary foul shot with 0.5s on the clock for the game’s final margin.

“It feels amazing, it’s nuts and I can’t even describe it,” Mallon said. “I came here seventh, eighth grade to come to games...I looked up and saw the rafters, and just thought ‘you’re in the Pavilion,’ and it’s just amazing.”


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