West York knocks out Greencastle-Antrim girls
This time, the game was a lot closer.
But West York still ended Greencastle-Antrim's season Tuesday night in the first round of the District 3 Class 5A girls basketball playoffs, defeating the Blue Devils 43-38 at Greencastle-Antrim High School.
"You have to tip your hat to them - they beat us twice," Greencastle coach Mike Rhine said. "They rebounded well and really shot well at the beginning and came out more ready to play."
The Blue Devils finished with a record of 18-6. West York (16-7) will face No. 1 seed Harrisburg (19-3) in a quarterfinal on Friday.
On Dec. 28, the Bulldogs outscored the Blue Devils 31-5 in the second half of a 52-24 victory.
For awhile Tuesday, it looked like this game would go the same way. Greencastle took a 2-1 lead on a Jenay Faulkner layup with 6:24 to go in the first quarter. They did not score again until another Faulkner layup more than nine minutes later, as West York opened up a 14-2 lead in the second quarter.
"We were getting the ball inside well, but then they started to neutralize that," West York coach Darrell Wildasin said. "After that we needed to kick it back out, but we didn't really see the people who were open."
Faulkner's second layup seemed to energize the Blue Devils and they finished the quarter on a 14-2 run, after having scored just seven points in the last three and a half quarters against the Bulldogs.
"I thought this time we did a much better job of pushing through against them," said Faulkner, who had 13 points and finished her remarkable career as the all-time leading scorer at G-A with 1,820 points.
However, Greencastle could never quite make it over the hump. The two teams played even in the the third quarter and it looked like it was going to be 28-27 going into the fourth, but freshman Alayna Harris knocked down a deep three at the buzzer to give the Bulldogs some breathing room.
The 3-pointers continued with three more in the fourth quarter, two by freshman Makenna Hoffman, to keep the Bulldogs ahead. Hoffman, Hoffman and Paige Weekly each finished with 10 points.
"My freshmen really came through tonight for us," Wildasin said. "For a young team like us, that kind of performance was huge."
Faulkner and Morgan Wagaman, another senior, tried to keep Greencastle in the game with a couple of fourth-quarter jumpers, but they weren't enough. Wagaman also finished with 13 points.
"It's tough because we really gave a lot of effort tonight, but we just came up short," Faulkner said. "Obviously, I wish I had made more shots."
West York now gets to play for a few more weeks, with at least three district games, and one state game.
Greencastle's season is over, although Rhine took away plenty of positives.
"I'm disappointed and I'm not disappointed," he said. "We had a good year and everybody played well tonight. We gave our full effort, so I'm happy with that."