Tuesday roundup: Can local teams keep winning?

Here's a quick primer for this week's prep sports action:

-- It's hard to imagine the YAIAA's hoops team faring better than they did last weekend. Of the eight York-Adams basketball teams to qualify for the state playoffs, seven won their first-round state playoffs last Friday and Saturday. Five of those teams will take the floor tonight for second-round contests. Two more will play tomorrow night.

Here is today's preview for those playoff games.

Just my opinion here (and to be honest, I haven't had the greatest record picking games this year ... just ask any of my colleagues) but I like the local teams' chances in a lot of these matchups. Even York Suburban, which seems the only clear-cut underdog of the bunch, doesn't have an insurmountable task in Lancaster Catholic. Both teams play similar half-court styles. All four teams to beat Suburban this year (Eastern York, William Penn, Steel-High, Susquehanna Township) are teams that can really push the pace, or at the very least have significantly superior athleticism. The Crusaders are more of slow-it-down, fundamental sort of squad. I don't know if Suburban wins this game, but at the very least I think it ends up being very close.

-- Bad news for Kennard-Dale football fans, with the news today that Doug Wilkinson is stepping down after an eight-year run as head coach. Wilkinson, 43, compiled a 28-54 record in his time at the helm, but that mark hardly does justice to his work with the program. He helped turn the Rams from a perennial doormat into one of the toughest, least-enjoyable teams in the area to play. Don't forget, this Rams team was oh-so-close to upsets in the District 3 playoffs each of the last two seasons. Wilkinson started something at Kennard-Dale, now we'll see if whoever replaces him can keep it going.

You can read Jim Seip's story on Wilkinson's decision to step down here.