Balanced scoring effort helps Pine-Richland top Woodland Hills, advance to 3rd straight WPIAL title game
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Wednesday, February 28, 2018 | 11:24 PM
When Pine-Richland coach Jeff Ackermann glanced at the scoreboard, what he saw worried him.
It wasn't so much the third-quarter score — the Rams were locked in a one-possession game with Woodland Hills — but rather the individual scorers listed to the side.
“We had two guys in doubles,” Ackermann said, “and a bunch of guys with two. If we were going to win this game, it was going to take a couple of other guys to step up.”
The Rams regained their balance when Andrew Kristofic scored three times in the third, and Greg Shulkosky made a clutch 3-pointer and two free throws late in the fourth, the secondary scoring No. 6 seed Pine-Richland needed to defeat No. 2 Woodland Hills, 65-61, in a WPIAL Class 6A semifinal Wednesday at North Hills.
Wolverines senior Amante Britt scored 31 points, junior Keandre Bowles added 14, and the two had Woodland Hills (20-4) on the verge of its first-ever finals appearance.
But Phil Jurkovec led Pine-Richland with 20 points, Dan Petcash scored 16 and a second-half surge from their teammates ultimately pushed the two-time defending WPIAL champions back to Petersen Events Center for the third consecutive year.
“To win a big playoff game like that, you need guys to step up every minute,” Jurkovec said, “and for us, that's what happened. If I stepped up one possession, somebody else stepped up the next, so we just kept feeding off each other.”
Jurkovec went 8 for 13 shooting, and Petcash made 6 of 10.
With a one-point lead and 1:26 left, the key shot was Shulkosky's 3-pointer from the left corner to lead 63-59. Shulkosky added two free throws with 21.6 seconds left and finished with 13 points. Kristofic added eight.
“That's why we're good,” Ackermann said, “because we have guys that step up for us. That's what makes us good.”
Pine-Richland (20-5) faces No. 5 Penn Hills (22-3) in the championship at 9 p.m. Saturday. With a win, the Rams would become just the second boys basketball team in history to win three consecutive WPIAL titles in the largest classification.
New Castle won three in a row from 1997-99 when Class 4A was the WPIAL's largest.
“Each year has been different,” Jurkovec said, “and each year we've had to play differently. But the one constant is we've had to play hard.”
Woodland Hills led 17-11 after one quarter and 35-33 at half Wednesday, in large part to Britt, the team's all-time leading scorer. He scored 16 in the first half on 8 of 16 shooting.
Pine-Richland took a nine-point lead in the third, but four turnovers in a two-minute span let Britt and Bowles rally Woodland Hills late in the fourth. Bowles scored consecutive layups a minute apart to cut Pine-Richland's lead to 60-59 with 1:50 left.
Answering Shulkosky's 3, Britt scored a put-back basket with 73 seconds left to trail 63-61. After two free throws by Shulkosky with 21.6 left, Britt had a 3-pointer rattle around inside the rim and bounce out.
“He was incredible,” Jurkovec said of Britt. “The only thing he doesn't have is size, but for how small he is, the way he plays, the way he gets separation is incredible.”
Britt is listed at 6-foot, but that's generous.
“We had no ability to guard him tonight, I know that much,” Ackermann said. “We tried different guys. We tried different things. … That's why we had to switch to a zone, because he was so good.”
Pine-Richland took the lead early in the third on five consecutive points by Petcash including a go-ahead 3-pointer to lead 38-37. Petcash's points sparked a 17-6 run.
The Rams quickly pushed their lead to 54-45 after consecutive baskets by 6-5 Jurkovec and 6-6 Kristofic, both in the paint. The two went 6 for 8 from the field in the second half as Pine-Richland's size became a factor.
Woodland Hills was out-rebounded by 10, but had mostly minimized the size mismatch in the first half.
“The key was their size and strength (versus) our quickness,” Woodland Hills coach Odell Miller said. “In the second half, it turned out to be their size and their strength. They were posting up their bigs, getting it down inside and we just didn't have an answer for that.”
Chris Harlan is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at charlan@tribweb.com or via Twitter @CHarlan_Trib.
Tags: Pine-Richland, Woodland Hills
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