Exeter, Muhlenberg well-armed to make a run as second season opens
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Their won-loss records took a beating due to a heavy dose of bouts with the top teams in Divisions 1 and 2 of the Berks Conference.
That means Exeter and Muhlenberg hit the road Monday on opening night of the District 3 Tournament dragging double-digit seeds with them.
Don’t be fooled: The 10th-seeded Eagles and 11th-seeded Muhls will not be pushovers when play begins in Class 5A. They’re dangerous clubs capable of pulling a first-round upset and making their way back to the state tournament.
“We’ve played really tough teams,” said Exeter coach Jeff VanGorder, whose team opens at No. 7 Lampeter-Strasburg at 7. “We’ve beaten (some) really good teams. So, that’s gotten us ready to see some really good teams come districts.”
The Eagles (15-8) got knocked out of the opening round of the Berks Conference tournament by Wilson, which took out the league’s other top teams – Berks Catholic and Reading High – on the way to a championship Friday night.
During the regular season the Eagles took their lumps against some top teams: Archbishop Carroll of the Philly Catholic League, an 18-win Perkiomen Valley team, Lancaster-Lebanon League champ Cedar Crest, a 19-win Spring-Ford team, as well as Berks Catholic, Muhlenberg, and Wilson.
They also scored impressive wins over Reading High and Berks Catholic. They’ll take those experiences – good and bad – into the second season.
“We’ll press reset,” VanGorder said last week after a loss at Wilson.
The Eagles are capable of playing and beating the top teams in the bracket. They’re averaging a league-best 69.7 points per game and have knocked down a staggering 212 3-pointers – that’s more than nine per game. Only one team in Berks history has averaged more.
Five players have hit 20 or more 3’s; seven have hit 14 or more. They’re led by senior point guard Kevin Saenz, who has 41 3’s and a 17.1 scoring average, fifth-highest in the league. Seniors Alex Kelsey and Reece Garvin are averaging 12.1 and 10.4 points per game, respectively. Sophomore Aidan Dauble is scoring 9.7 points per game and has added the 3-point shot to his game. Junior Brady Murray has 40 3’s and shoots a team-best 88.9 percent at the foul line.
Saenz and Garvin were starters and Kelsey and Dauble key reserves last year as Exeter went 27-7, won its first district title and reached the PIAA title game. That experience should prove invaluable now.
“These guys are going to be excited and ready to go,” VanGorder said. “They’re defending district champions. I think they’re motivated by that.”
To return to the state tournament the Eagles will have to get past a Lampeter-Strasburg team that ended the regular season with 10 wins in its final 11 games, among them a 25-point win over eventual Lancaster-Lebanon League champ Cedar Crest.
The Lancaster-Lebanon League Section 3 champion Pioneers are led by Chase Smucker, who averages 18.1 points per game. The Pioneers won the Class 5A Tournament in 2022 and entered last year as the No. 2 seed before losing its opener at home to No. 7 Hershey.
Muhlenberg (14-9) is looking for a repeat of last season when it went on the road as the No. 9 seed and took out West York 46-39 in the opening round.
Like Exeter it has played a grueling schedule this season, with losses to Central Dauphin – the No. 5 seed in Class 6A – Berks Catholic – the No. 1 seed in 4A – and Berks I champ Reading High. The Muhls beat Fleetwood – the No. 2 seed in 4A – in the league quarterfinals before losing to Reading in the next round.
Muhlenberg, like Exeter, made an extended playoff run last season, beating West York, Warwick and Milton Hershey in districts and Unionville in the PIAA Tournament.
The Muhls, though, didn’t return as much experience as the Eagles. They had to replace their top five scorers, then lost one of last year’s key reserves, Michael Miller – he scored 15 points in that state playoff win — midway through the season with a knee injury.
Alex Collado, a key reserve last season, has bumped up his game and is averaging 14.4 points, with a team-leading 34 3-pointers. No one, though, has turned their game around as much as junior Shermar Killens. He didn’t get many minutes last season but has been one of the league’s top players this season, averaging a team-leading 16.1 points.
West York (14-8), the No. 6 seed, also did an overhaul this season, with just one return starter. The Bulldogs lost their first four games but bounced back to tie for the YCIAA Division II title, knocking down 147 3’s along the way. They won nine of their final 10 regular season games before being knocked out in the league quarterfinals by Littlestown, the No. 3 seed in Class 4A.
First-round losers in Class 5A will see their season end; the winners clinch a PIAA Tournament spot.
Four other Berks teams – Reading High and Wilson in Class 6A, Schuylkill Valley in 4A and Oley Valley in 3A – open district play Tuesday. Berks Catholic and Fleetwood, the top two seeds in 4A, don’t open until Friday, as does Antietam, the No. 3 seed in 2A.