Bright future little solace as Bulldogs see championship season come to an end
2024 Berks basketball coverage presented by
Utilities Employees Credit Union
By Mike Drago — MikeDragoSports.com Managing Editor
SOUTH LEBANON — In the moments following Wilson’s district playoff win over Cedar Crest last season Bulldogs coach Matt Coldren tried to console his counterpart, telling Tommy Smith not to despair, that his team’s future looked bright.
Tuesday, after the Bulldogs’ District 3 Class 6A opener at Cedar Crest, Smith offered the same advice to Coldren: Don’t hang your head, you have everybody back.
A few weeks from now, after Coldren has fully digested the ups and downs of this season, those words might provide some comfort. But not right now.
For now the Bulldogs are reeling from their 55-50 loss to the seventh-seeded Falcons at The Cage, one that ended their season.
“It’s really hard,” said Tommy Hunsicker, the lone senior in Wilson’s starting lineup. “It hasn’t sunk in yet.”
The 10th-seeded Bulldogs trailed most of the night and were down 13 at one point late in the third quarter. Their spirited comeback, and the fact that they made this a one-possession game in the final minute, only made it sting that much more.
A bounce here, a deflection there, and they could well be heading to Cumberland Valley Friday night to play the second-seeded Eagles, just one win away from a return to the PIAA Tournament. Instead, the Lancaster-Lebanon League champion Falcons get that shot.
“It’s a great group of kids who love each other,” Coldren said of a team that saw its season come to a screeching halt just when things were getting good, four days after beating Reading High for the Berks Conference championship. “They wanted more.”
The Bulldogs fell behind for good when RJ Young scored in transition with 30 seconds left in the first quarter. They spent the rest of the night running uphill against a scrappy Cedar Crest team that presented all kinds of problems with their aggressive guards and a pair of effective bigs, 6-6 Aiden Schomp and the 6-7 Young.
The Falcons gave up no open shots, tried to take the 3-point line away from Madyx Gruber and Correll Akings and hit the floor repeatedly to win 50-50 balls.
“They’re aggressive and they gave us trouble,” Coldren said of Cedar Crest guards Owen Chernich and Leo Tirado.
A month ago, when Cedar Crest beat Wilson 70-61 on the same court, Smith called it a complete effort, one of his team’s better games.
The Falcons were at the top of their game again Tuesday, especially shooting the ball. They hit 60 percent for the game and knocked down 7-of-12 3-pointers – including a couple that bounced around the soft rims before trickling through.
Schomp, who had just five 3’s all season, hit one. Junior Danny Speaks, who made nine 3’s in his first 24 games, came off the bench and nailed each of his three 3-point attempts. Fernando Marquez made eight 3’s before Tuesday, when he swished 2-of-3 from beyond the arc.
“They shot way better than they normally do,” Coldren said.
“They made a lot of good shots tonight, had a lot of open shots,” Hunsicker said. “They were finding the holes (in our zone) and they were banging the shots, which happens.”
Back-to-back 3’s by Speaks and Chernich pushed Cedar Crest’s lead to 43-30 with 1:15 left in the third quarter.
The Bulldogs turned to their fullcourt zone press to get back into it. They entered the final quarter down 12 but cut that down to size with a 7-0 opening run in the fourth. They continued to force the action with their defense caused seven fourth-quarter turnovers.
Wilson pulled within 52-50 on Akings’ three-point play with 1:05 remaining and this battle of champions looked like it was headed to the wire – maybe even overtime.
“There was no doubt that we were gonna win,” Hunsicker said. “Even when we were down (13) we still felt we had a path back.”
The Falcons were close to hitting tilt. Chernich picked up his fourth foul with 2:05 left; Tirado got his fourth with 1:20 to go. When Marquez missed the back end of a two-shot foul with 56 seconds to go he left the door open for the Bulldogs, but they couldn’t take advantage.
Young swatted away Tom McFadden game-tying 3-point bid with 40 seconds left – his sixth block of the night.
Next time down, after Tirado had extended the lead to four with a free throw, Gruber and Akings put up 3’s but neither connected. Tirado all-but clinched it when he made it a five-point game with a free throw with 11 seconds left.
And just like that Wilson’s season was over.
“It is what it is,” Hunsicker said of the unfortunate pairing of league champs in the opening round. “That’s just a great game between two teams that had momentum coming into it; that (kind of match-up) is gonna happen sometimes. The better team won tonight.”
Akings, a sophomore and all-division pick, scored a game-high 18 points. Gruber, a junior and All-Berks pick, scored 15. Luke Levan, a 6-6 junior, scored 10. They’ll all be back for Wilson; Tirado, Chernich and the other two seniors in Crest’s lineup won’t be.
“We’re a super-young team,” Hunsicker offered. “I saw the sophomores and juniors grow
into leaders by the end of the year. I’m excited to see what they do in the future.”
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | Final | |
| Wilson | 13 | 9 | 11 | 17 | 50 |
| Cedar Crest | 14 | 10 | 21 | 10 | 55 |
| Bulldogs (17-9) | FG | FT | 3s | A | R | Points |
| Gruber | 6-16 | 2-2 | 1-5 | 0 | 3 | 15 |
| T. Hunsicker | 1-2 | 0-0 | 1-1 | 1 | 3 | 3 |
| McFadden | 1-5 | 1-2 | 1-3 | 1 | 3 | 4 |
| Akings | 7-16 | 1-1 | 3-7 | 1 | 1 | 18 |
| Levan | 5-8 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 4 | 10 |
| Etim | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Zullinger | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 4 | 2 | 0 |
| Twiford | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| C. Hunsicker | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Totals | 20-48 | 4-5 | 6-16 | 7 | 18/21 | 60 |
| Falcons (20-5) | FG | FT | 3s | A | R | Points |
| Tirado | 1-1 | 2-4 | 0-0 | 1 | 1 | 4 |
| Marquez | 6-10 | 1-1 | 2-3 | 0 | 4 | 15 |
| Chernich | 2-5 | 0-0 | 1-3 | 2 | 4 | 5 |
| Young | 2-4 | 1-2 | 0-1 | 0 | 4 | 5 |
| Schomp | 5-6 | 4-4 | 1-1 | 2 | 6 | 15 |
| Speaks | 3-5 | 0-0 | 3-3 | 0 | 2 | 9 |
| Custer | 1-1 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Waranavage | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Groff | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Totals | 20-33 | 8-11 | 7-12 | 5 | 21/23 | 55 |
Turnovers: Wilson 13, Cedar Crest 17. Team rebounds: Wilson 3, Cedar Crest 2.
