Steve Yoder’s biggest concern heading into last night’s District XI Class 6A quarterfinal match-up against a smaller Pocono Mountain West squad was how would his team handle the quickness and relentless pressure of the Panthers.
His team did just fine with that and because of it, the Hornets are moving on.
Pocono Mountain West had their own problems taking care of the basketball against a much taller and hungrier bunch of Hornets who have their eye on one thing: ending a 33-year drought and winning only the program’s second district title in school history.
Senior Mark Swedberg led a balanced scoring attack as he matched his career-high with 24 points, while classmate Zach Sabol added 21 while reaching yet another milestone as Emmaus pulled away in the second half for a 76-60 win over the Panthers at Allen High School.
With the victory, top-seeded Emmaus (21-5) advances to the semifinals for the third straight season at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday at Freedom High School to take on a familiar foe in Allen, the No. 5 seed, which defeated fourth-seeded Pocono Mountain East in overtime 72-69.
This will be the third match-up between the two squads with the Hornets winning both meetings, 71-66 in the regular-season and most-recently in the EPC semifinals 61-55. Emmaus will be looking to reach the finals for the first time since the 2013-14 season.
The Hornets are also headed to the PIAA State Tournament for the fourth straight season and for the fifth time in the last six years.
“We put it out there for the kids and we didn’t want them to be afraid of it or shy away from it,” said Yoder inside of his team’s locker room. ” We said ‘we are not done coaching you guys yet. We love you guys and we want to keep coaching the heck out of you. Win tonight and we’re guaranteed three more games. I think they embraced that.”
Added Yoder: “I’m probably having as much as fun in my 11 years that I’ve had here with this group.”
The Hornets 11th year coach had to love the way his team handled the pressure of the Panthers all night, especially after halftime.
Emmaus led by seven at the break (32-25) but came out of the locker room and outscored the Panthers 21-11 to open up with its largest lead of the game at 17 (53-36).
Swedberg had a monster third quarter for the Hornets scoring 10 points and then added 12 more in the final eight minutes to lead the Hornets. Most of his points came off easy layups.
“We had the ball coming out of the third (quarter) and I told the boys I wanted to run this set for Mark because he was a little frustrated in the first half,” said Yoder. “He’s a big-time scorer for us and we wanted to get him going, and ‘boy’ he scored on that play and away he went.”
“We practiced this endlessly preparing for this game, breaking their press for layups and that’s exactly what we did. Mark and Zach were phenomenal, but the guards deserve all the credit for getting them the ball in position where they can score easily. Hats off to Ethan (Parvel), Danny (Bohman), Bryce (Diehl), Cam (Brooks) and Devon (Boyko).”
Parvel continued his stellar play in the post-season as he added 16 points to go along with a team-high 10 assists, while Diehl just missed reaching double figures finishing with nine points and seven rebounds.
Sabol, who recorded his 1,000th career point in his team’s EPC playoff win over Central Catholic two weeks ago, needed just three rebounds entering tonight’s game to reach 1,000 for his career and reached the milestone early in the opening quarter.
“As far as we know it hasn’t been done in 50 years,” said Yoder of a player scoring 1,000 points and 1,000 rebounds. “By now everyone in the valley knows about Zach and what a great kid he is and he could care less about the numbers. He just wants to win and move on and that’s what makes him so special.”
Pocono Mountain West, the No. 9 seed, was led by senior Ishyne Pilgrim who had a team-high 22 points before fouling out late in the fourth quarter. Classmate Rafael Valentin had four 3-pointers and finished with 19 for the Panthers who saw their season end at 13-11.
Like Emmaus boys basketball on facebook, follow on twitter (@Emmaussports) for continued updates on the team throughout the season.
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Emmaus 76, PM West 60 (District XI Quarterfinals)
PMW – Dashaun Ford 3 0-0 8, Ishyne Pilgrim 8 6-6 22, Eddie Germosan 3 0-0 8, Rafael Valentin 6 3-4 19, Maurice Whittle 0 0-0 0, Jason Walker 1 0-0 3, Lawson Bray 0 0-0 0. Totals: FG 21, FT 9-10, 3s (9 – Ford 2, Germosan 2, Valentin 4, Walker)
Em – Bryce Diehl 4 1-2 9, Zach Sabol 7 7-7 21, Ethan Parvel 7 0-1 16, Mark Swedberg 11 2-6 24, Danny Bohman 0 0-0 0, Cam Brooks 1 0-0 2, Devon Boyko 1 0-0 2, Josh Moyer 1 0-0 2. Totals: FG 32, FT 10-16, 3s (2 – Parvel 2)
PMW – 13 – 12 – 11 – 24 – 60
Em – 16 – 16 – 21 – 23 – 76