The Canaries are officially the kings of summer basketball.
Allen completed a rare sweep of the major local summer high school
tournaments, beating Constitution of the Philadelphia Public League, 45-33,
Sunday night at Cedar Beach for the title of the SportsFest A-town Throwdown
boys basketball tournament.
Last week, Allen prevailed in the 64-team Stellar Construction tournament and
this time it came out on top of a 44-team field.
Which was one was more meaningful?
"Well, for me, this was my first title as a coach, so this was special," said
acting Allen coach Bob Freed, who filled in for the vacationing Doug Snyder.
Allen became the first team since Parkland in 1998 to win two major summer
basketball tournaments.
"It's nice to have the recognition that comes with winning these two
tournaments," Freed said. "The kids played hard when they had to. Sometimes we
played down to the level of the competition.
"The thing that will take us from a good team to a very good team is the
mental approach. We have the physical part. We run our offense and play
defense, but sometimes we need some work in our mental approach."
Allen had to match the physical toughness of Constitution, a program entering
just its second year of competition in the PIAA.
Constitution, a relatively new school, was a late tourney fill-in for Freire
Charter and made the most of its opportunity.
"We would have liked a different outcome in the last game, but we were happy
with everything," Constitution coach Robert Moore said. "Allentown's a tough
team. Remember, we're just a single-A school in the PIAA. We only have 300
kids in our school and they have 4,500.
"We got to the quarterfinals of the Philly Public League last year and won our
first state playoff game in Class A last year. So, we're getting there and
playing in a tournament like this was a great experience. We stayed up here
all weekend and really enjoyed ourselves."
It looked like Constitution might leave with the championship trophy as it
hurt Allen inside in the first half. The Canaries trailed 15-13 with about
four minutes to go before halftime.
But Allen tightened up its interior defense and went on a 12-0 run to take
control of the game.
It was 25-17 at halftime and Allen scored the first five points of the second
half to open a 13-point lead.
"They were a physical Philly team, but we had to get out and run on them,"
Harrington said.
"In both the semifinal [a 50-40 win over North Penn] and in this game, we
played exceptional half-court defense," Freed said. "These were our two best
games in the tournament defensively."
Robert Rodriguez hit a big 3-pointer late in the first-half surge and was
5-for-6 at the line to help the Canaries put the game away down the stretch.
Jalen Cannon was a force inside with nine points, nine rebounds and three
blocks.
Constitution kept competing, but couldn't get the deficit below nine points.
•Tournament director Chris Lakatosh said this was his best tournament in the
three years he has been running SportsFest's boys basketball event.
"This was by far our best," Lakatosh said. "I heard from the other coaches
saying that the caliber of the competition was the best we've had and the
slam-dunk and 3-point shooting contest Saturday night were big highlights. We
had a huge crowd down here and that created a lot of excitement. And tonight,
with Allen playing for the championship, the atmosphere was electric again."
Lakatosh said he hopes to add four more teams for next year, but said he
didn't anticipate going beyond 48 teams.
•The varsity all-tourney team consisted of Cannon of Allen, Lamont Clark of
Octorara, Mamadou Diakite of Constitution, Chris McMullin of Bensalem and Matt
Possanza of North Penn.
Emmaus won the JV tournament, beating Reading in the final. The Green Hornets'
Gabe Shankweiler was MVP and the all-tourney team featured Luke Moyer
(Souderton), Deonte Robertson (Liberty), Baba Wales and Jamal Smith of Reading
and Derek Stannous (Emmaus).
•Wall2Wall Urban Youth Network won the Riser Division title, beating the
Philly Heat in the finals. K.J. Williams of Bethlehem was named the MVP. "The
kids were great and really played well together," said coach Chuck Rock more.
For more scores, see Sports 9.
STELLAR SCOREBOARD
BOYS VARSITY A-TOWN THROWDOWN
Round of 16
North Penn 47, Easton 38 ... Possanza 12.
Nazareth (Brooklyn) 41, Liberty 34 ... Roberts 14.
Octorara 54, Salisbury 34 ... James Brown 16.
Springfield-Delco 52, Wissahickon 50 ... Washington 12.
Constitution 62, Reading 41 ... Erik Ralegh 16.
Bensalem 38, Pottstown 23 ... Calvin Brown high scorer.
Allen 65, Becahi 48 ... Harrington 18.
Emmaus 43, Freedom 31 ... Steve Jaindl 10.
Quarterfinals
Octorara 43, Nazareth of Brooklyn 40 ... Charles Cooper 11.
North Penn 40, Springfield-Delco 33 ... Possanza 11.
Allen 39, Bensalem 36 ... D.J. Brown 11.
Constitution 44, Emmaus 37 ... Drakite 11.
Semifinals
Allen 50, North Penn 40
Constitution 69, Octorara 44.