If the bright lights are on, so are the Red Knights

Big games seem to bring out the best in the Reading High Red Knights.

They clicked in the second half at Giant Center Saturday night, scoring 15 straight at one point to put away Warwick 68-43 for the District 3 Class 6A championship.

It was Reading’s second straight district title and 12th straight postseason win.

The Red Knights went from winning the Berks Conference championship at Santander Arena to another big showing in the big house in Hershey.

“There’s something about the bright lights to me,” said Reading junior Myles Grey. “Not a lot of people can play at a high level in the bright lights on a big court, but we did it.”

Berks Player of the Year Ruben Rodriguez, who loves the big stage, led the way with 23 points in another all-around performance. The Red Knights also got a career-high 19 points from Joey Chapman, who has taken his play to a new level since moving into the starting lineup to take the place of injured Daniel Alcantara.

Now the Red Knights move onto the final stage of the season, the PIAA Tournament.

The defending champs open Wednesday at 7 at the Geigle against Downingtown West (18-9), the No. 12 finisher out of District 1.

The game seems to a bit of a mismatch. The Whippets (18-9) lost three times in four games in the District 1 Tournament, the latest 56-45 to Haverford in the 11th-place game.

Anything can happen in a one-and-done tournament, as Reading fans know all too well. Surely Red Knights head coach Rick Perez will remind his players about what happened in the opening round of the 2008 PIAA Tournament. He was an Red Knights assistant coach at the time.

Reading was 30-0 and coming off a district championship when it faced the No. 8 seed out of District 1, Souderton. The Red Knights weren’t properly prepared for that game and were eliminated, 66-58.

District 1 is the deepest in the state when it comes to Big School basketball. It has produced 10 state champions since 2000: Chester (five times), Lower Merion (twice), Coatesville and Penn Wood. Eight other District 1 teams reached the PIAA title game.

The Whippets aren’t seen as a title contender but could prove troublesome because they have the one thing the Red Knights don’t: A big man. Junior Jake Warren is 6-10 and has an offer from St. Joseph’s.

Now that Alcantara is done for the season Reading’s tallest starters are 6-2 center Xavier Davis and Chapman, who’s also 6-2 and has been assigned to post duty in recent games. Those two did superb work against Cedar Cliff’s twin towers, Tyler and Justin Houser, 6-9 and 6-10, respectively, in a 46-39 district semifinalist victory.

The Whippets’ top player is 5-10 junior guard Dylan Blair, who went over 1,000 career points in the district tournament.

Downingtown West entered the District 1 Tournament as the No. 6 seed but was upset in its first game by No. 22 Plymouth-Whitemarsh, 63-58. Blair scored 25 points in the next round as the Whippets beat Perkiomen Valley 77-68 to clinch a state berth.

The Whippets lost their final two playback games, 61-53 to West Chester East and to Haverford.

Blair scored 24 points in a 60-47 win over Wilson in late January; the Bulldogs played without leading scorer Cameron Jones, who was on a football recruiting trip.

If they Red Knights win their state opener they could get a rematch against Archbishop Wood, the team they beat for last year’s title, and again at midseason at the Geigle, 64-58.

Wood, the third-place team out of District 12, opens Wednesday at Plymouth-Whitemarsh, the No. 5 finisher out of District 1.

Also Wednesday:

Tulpehocken (19-6), the third-place finisher in the District 3 Class 3A Tournament, plays at West Catholic (19-5), the District 12 runner-up.

Antietam (20-5), the runner-up in the District 3 Class 2A Tournament, plays Holy Cross (19-6), the District 2 champ, at Lackawanna College at 7.

Last year the PIAA Tournament was truncated. Only district champions qualified. Reading High opened with a 68-53 win over Scranton at Berks Catholic, beat Upper St. Clair 68-46 at Altoona in the semifinals and Archbishop Wood 58-57 in the championship game at Giant Center.

The Red Knights haven’t lost a PIAA Tournament game since 2019. In 2020 they beat St. Joseph’s Prep and Bethlehem Freedom before the tournament was suspended due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

The Red Knights went without a state win in Perez’s first four seasons but have gone 14-3 in state play since, with five straight wins and a PIAA championship in 2017.

Perez is closing on Jim Gano’s record of 251 coaching victories. He enters the state tournament with a 248-72 record in 11 seasons. The Red Knights would have to win three times and reach the state semifinals for him to tie that mark this season.

Gano went 251-50 with an incredible .831 winning percentage — highest in Berks history — in 10 seasons as Reading’s head coach, from 1971-81. He won six district titles but never got a state title, losing to General Braddock in 1973 in his only appearance.