City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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CHELTENHAM — With Cheltenham having serious issues putting the ball through the hoop for the opening half of their PIAA Class 6A state playoff game against Cedar Cliff, Pat Fleury’s message to his boys was simple: keep playing your game, and it’ll either work, or it won’t.

It worked.

“We just talked about getting back and staying true to what we do and living with the result,” Fleury said. “And from there, I felt like the pressure was off of them at that point.”

The Panthers’ defensive pressure eventually wore down the Colts, and the shots started falling in time as Cheltenham overcame a double-digit second-half deficit to pick up a 52-44 win in the first round of the state playoffs.

Early on, the story was the play of Cedar Cliff senior Tyler Houser, the 6-foot-9 forward and Virginia Military Institute commit showing off his improved range with a pair of first-half 3-pointers. With Houser and his younger brother, 6-10 sophomore Justin Houser, giving Cheltenham fits inside defensively, the Colts (21-7) got out to a 24-15 halftime lead.

The Panthers missed all six 3-pointers they took in the first half and were 0-of-5 from the line in the second quarter alone, shooting themselves in the foot, even as they forced nine Cedar Cliff first-half turnovers.

When Mike Armanini and then Aiden Frey knocked down triples midway through the third quarter, the lead was 30-19 in the visitors’ favor, but the turnovers were already in the double digits, and the cracks were starting to show.

“We knew if we could control the tempo of the game with turnovers and rebounding, the game would be in our favor, we could get the ball in positions we wanted to,” Cedar Cliff coach Tigh Savercool said. “The last two minutes [of the first half] started the momentum in the wrong direction for us, and we never quite fully closed Pandora’s box.”

By the end of the third quarter, when Elias Walker fed Justin Savage on a beautiful wraparound pass for a buzzer-beating layup, Cheltenham (29-1) had the deficit down to 39-33. The large Cheltenham student section and generally pro-Panthers crowd provided all the energy they could give, drowning out a decent group of Cedar Cliff fans who made the two-hour drive out from the Harrisburg area to see their squad.

The tide really turned in the fourth quarter, Cheltenham holding Cedar Cliff to just a single shot attempt in the first half of the period, getting steal after steal — they tallied 15 for the game — and closing the gap, inch by inch. 

Savage, who finished with a team-high 14 points, brought the Panthers within two points by going 1-of-2 from the line twice in a row with six minutes to play, and it was tied for the first time with 5:23 left. 

Cheltenham’s first lead came via a 3-pointer off the fingertips of the team’s only non-senior starter, freshman Josiah Hutson, who put the Panthers up 44-41 with 3:51 to play. Hutson finished with 13 points, knocking down two more foul shots to make it a six-point game with 39 seconds to play, adding a team-high six steals and three assists.

“We got him from Cedarbrook Middle School. We watched him from there, we thought that he’d be able to help us,” Fleury said of the 6-1 guard, who’s been a starter all year long for a team which finished the regular season unbeaten, taking its only loss in the District 1 semifinals. “When he was given the opportunity, I don’t think he blinked at it [...] if you’re open, it’s 50/50, make or miss. He’s made a couple big shots for us this year, so we’re confident with him shooting it.”

Cheltenham ended up forcing 22 Cedar Cliff turnovers, committing just six on their own, winning the fourth quarter 19-5 to advance.

“As long as we got the rebound and started pushing the ball — got easy layups, easy baskets, they couldn’t run with us,” Savage said. 

Savage complemented his team high in scoring with 10 rebounds, two steals and two blocks. Senior wing guard Rasheem Dearry tied Hutson with 13 points, adding seven rebounds, three steals and a block.

Tyler Houser finished with 15 points, 11 rebounds, five assists and a block. He finished his career with 1,014 points, entering the night just one shy of the milestone and taking care of it early.

“Tyler’s been someone that has shown that when you work on it, you can evolve your game,” Savercool said. “Just as recently as a year ago, he was a back-to-the-bucket block kid, he wasn’t shooting 3s, and he really evolved his game and is a product of if you want to work at something and get better at something, just put in the time, and it comes.”

Two years after their season was ended prematurely by the early stages of the COVID pandemic in the second round of the PIAA tournament, the Panthers will have a chance to better that result against Penn Wood in the second round on Saturday. The Patriots (16-8), who earned the No. 10 seed out of District 1, upset District 11 champs Parkland, 60-50, on the road on Wednesday night.

“We consider ourselves the underdogs,” Fleury said. “We weren’t No. 1 in our district, we consider ourselves the underdogs in every matchup that we play. We’ve got to play hard and just push through.”

“I feel like I should have a gold medal in my room right now, a state championship, right now,” Savage said, referencing the unfinished run two years back. “But if we get it this year, I’ll be even happier. I’ll live with the process.”

By Quarter
Cheltenham:   9   |   6   |  18  |  19  ||  52
Cedar Cliff:    15  |   9   |  15  |   5   ||  44

Shooting    
Cheltenham: 18-48 FG (3-14 3PT), 13-22 FT
Cedar Cliff: 16-33 FG (5-13 3PT), 7-13 FT

Scoring
Cheltenham: Justin Savage 14, Josiah Hutson 13, Rasheem Dearry 13, Brandon Bush 6, Elias Walker 6
Cedar Cliff: Tyler Houser 15, Aiden Frey 8, Mike Armanini 8, Charlie Werner 5, Justin Houser 4, Sam Grube 2, Trenten Smith 2