SCRANTON \u2013 Packy Doherty drained his final shot inside of the Xavier Center as the horn sounded to sub him out.<\/p>\n
With the Scranton Prep student section shouting and chanting his name, the Cavalier took a moment to soak it all in.<\/p>\n
One final time. One final moment inside of a gym where he reigned supreme the last four seasons.<\/p>\n
And the senior gave his fans a show in the second half of Friday\u2019s PIAA Class 4A boys\u2019 basketball state opener against Schuylkill Valley.<\/p>\n
Doherty drained shots from every square inch of Keller Court, hitting all five of his attempts in the third quarter, finishing with 19 of his 25 points in the final 16 minutes as the Cavaliers slowly pulled away from the Panthers, 65-48, to advance into the second round Tuesday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the end, when I got subbed out, I just tried to look around and take everything in,\u201d Doherty said. \u201cI\u2019m never going to get the chance to play here again. This was my home for the last few years. This was awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n
Up next for Scranton Prep (21-5) is District 11 third-placer Salisbury (24-4), which knocked off District 12 runner-up West Philadelphia, 54-45.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery team, from now on, is a very good one. We have to look at this next one, have a few good days of practice and get ready,\u201d said Prep senior Brody Martin.<\/p>\n
Fire and intensity.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s what the Cavaliers brought in the second half after a first 16 minutes where head coach Larry Reagan felt his team was flat.<\/p>\n
What was the flint that lit that fire at halftime?<\/p>\n
Maybe it was Martin\u2019s offensive determination on the boards from the first half where the senior pulled down five and the Cavaliers, as a team, grabbed 16.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were down two starting bigs, so we really focused on crashing the glass and boxing on in all five positions,\u201d Martin said. \u201cOur mindset was different in the second half. We knew we needed to get stops. I just don\u2019t think we were getting enough stops in the first half.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maybe it was realization that this was it. One final chance inside of the Xavier Center for the District 2 champs. One opportunity to walk off the court as winners.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt halftime, we told them that they didn\u2019t come up here to play their last game in Scranton. So you have to go and take it,\u201d Reagan said. \u201cI thought our seniors did a good job of making sure we came out with a different energy. And that showed up on the scoreboard at the end.\u201d<\/p>\n
Charlie Skoff\u2019s steal and one-handed tomahawk jam with five seconds left before halftime certainly didn\u2019t hurt, either, as it gave Prep a 26-24 lead at the break.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was a huge momentum boost. We needed something like that heading into halftime,\u201d Doherty said. \u201cI think that set the tone for the third quarter.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schuylkill Valley, the third-place team out of District 3, threw an early haymaker, stringing together a 7-0 run to take a 31-30 lead just two minutes into the third quarter.<\/p>\n
For the Panthers, Josiah Urbaez had 15 points and Tanner Staus added 11.<\/p>\n
Doherty landed the knockout hook.<\/p>\n
The senior spun in the lane for a contested layup. He then followed it up with a baseline drive past a Panther defender for another layup. Add in a half-court steal and uncontested bucket, and it sparked a 16-2 Cavalier run over a four-minute stretch of the third as Prep exploded out to a 46-33 lead.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first half, my shot just wasn\u2019t falling,\u201d Doherty said. \u201cI have a lot of trust in my shot, and thankfully, it started dropping. It\u2019s all preparation. My dad and I, we go shooting before every game, and it really prepares me for these moments. Having a great shooting night on my last game here means so much.\u201d<\/p>\n
His corner 3-pointer with 5:12 left \u2013 the fifth of the game for the senior \u2013 all put sealed the victory, giving the District 2 champ a 15-point lead.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s capable of going off like that,\u201d Reagan said of Doherty. \u201cWe needed it tonight, and thankfully, he was able to deliver for us. Over the last three years, I\u2019ve gotten used to watching that. Hopefully, I\u2019ll be able to watch a few more games of him doing that. It will be sad to see him leave when he graduates.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was a slow start for Prep, which shot just 10 of 32 in the first half, and couldn\u2019t find a way to pull away from the Panthers.<\/p>\n
Alex Scanlan\u2019s spin and jumper gave his side the 21-13 edge, but when it looked like Prep would begin to open up some distance, Schuylkill Valley (16-11) answered with a 11-3 run to knot it at 24-24 with 53 seconds before the break.<\/p>\n
But it was the one-handed slam by Skoff that set the Xavier Center on fire, and provided some momentum heading into the locker room.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe weren\u2019t thrilled with the effort on the defensive end of the floor in the first half, and that\u2019s got to be better. But we had some guys step up and make some plays. Charlie Skoff did a great job of protecting the rim, and Alex Scanlan gave us some good minutes. We just have to be a little better on that end,\u201d Reagan said.<\/p>\n
Martin finished with 15 points, including three free throws down the stretch in the fourth, while Skoff dropped seven of his 10 in the first half.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a lot of energy in here tonight, and that\u2019s props to our crowd and our great student section,\u201d Martin said. \u201cThat third quarter, it was nice, and I think Charlie\u2019s big dunk before the half really got us going. That was a huge momentum changer.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SCRANTON \u2013 Packy Doherty drained his final shot inside of the Xavier Center as the horn sounded to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":131963,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[349,305,28,178,180,179,726,706],"class_list":["post-131962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-berks-county","tag-high-school-sports","tag-pennsylvania","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news","tag-sports","tag-top-stories-reg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131962"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131962\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131963"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}