SOUTH LEBANON – Style points don’t matter when a title is on the line, having more points than the other team does. Cedar Crest’s overall performance against McCaskey on Friday night at home wasn’t pretty, but the Falcons locked up the Lancaster-Lebanon Section One championship with a hard-fought 53-52 win over the Red Tornado.
Cedar Crest’s journey came full circle too. The Falcons opened their season in December’s Lebanon High Tip-Off Tournament, where they routed Red Land before edging Elco for the championship.
It ended with all the Crest players and coaches cutting down the nets on their home court.
“We haven’t won a section championship in a long time and we’ve been so close, so close,” said Cedar Crest head coach, Tom Smith.
It was Senior Night at the Falcon Cage and ironically, it was Cedar Crest’s senior trio of Ileri Ayo-Faleye, Grant Allwein and Jason Eberhart that orchestrated the offense. This threesome combined for 12 field goals and each finished with 11 points, accounting for 63 percent of the Falcons’ scoring output.
Ayo-Faleye went five of eight from the free throw line while slamming home a pair of dunks. Ayo-Faleye’s first slam came early in the opening quarter, setting the tone and getting the crowd on its feet.
Eberhart penned five field goals and capped the third quarter with consecutive layups, including a buzzer-beater that stretched the Crest lead to six. Meanwhile, Allwein had four makes of his own, including a three.
Despite these heroics, the Red Tornado kept closing the gap, thanks to the play of junior forward, Samir Gordon, and senior guard, Elijah Terry. This duo combined for 30 points during McCaskey’s January 14th win over the Falcons and both were determined to lead the Tornado to a sweep.
Gordon tallied nine of his game-high 14 points in the first half, preventing Cedar Crest from turning the contest into a runaway. Terry, on the other hand, had a hot second half, where he registered eight of his 10 points.
Fortunately, Falcons’ senior forward, Cole Miller, came alive in the fourth quarter. Miller inked eight points and five of those came during the final period.
When the Falcons struggled to put the game away down the stretch, Miller answered on a game-sealing free throw with 4.4 seconds remaining. McCaskey answered with a three at the horn, but the outcome was already decided and the fans stormed the court in triumph.
“We let them slip through our fingertips, so finishing the season off with winning the section championship, putting ourselves in a good place going into the playoffs, it means the world to these seniors,” Smith said. “They busted their tails and they deserve this light, I’m so proud of them.”
The feeling was glorious, but extra special at the same time since Cedar Crest won its first section title since 2015. The Falcons have now won five in-a-row to improve their record to 19-2 for the season. Crest soars into the playoffs with a ton of confidence, but they look to win number 20 in Tuesday’s regular-season finale at Manheim Township.
McCaskey had won 10 of its last 11 prior to last night’s loss to the Falcons. With three regular season games remaining, the Red Tornado, now 13-6, looks to win them all going into the playoffs. This stretch includes two non-league contests with Exeter and CD East as well as the final league encounter, which takes place this Tuesday night against Hempfield.
| Date | Opponents | Outcomes | |
| 12/06 6:00 pm | Red Land Cedar Crest at Lebanon | 29 70 | Nonleague |
| 12/07 7:30 pm | Elco Cedar Crest at Lebanon | 55 59 | Nonleague |
| 12/09 7:30 pm | Wyomissing at Cedar Crest | 47 59 | Nonleague |
| 12/13 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at Elizabethtown | 45 41 | League |
| 12/16 7:30 pm | Lebanon at Cedar Crest | 55 57 | League |
| 12/18 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at Ephrata | 57 26 | League |
| 12/20 7:30 pm | Warwick at Cedar Crest | 50 55 | League |
| 12/21 7:00 pm | Cedar Crest at Palmyra | 60 40 | Nonleague |
| 12/27 7:30 pm | Oxford at Cedar Crest | 38 51 | Nonleague |
| 12/28 7:30 pm | Lebanon at Cedar Crest | 49 59 | Nonleague |
| 1/02 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at Conestoga Valley | 52 46 | League |
| 1/04 4:30 pm | Cedar Crest Lower Dauphin at Lebanon Valley College | 46 58 | Nonleague |
| 1/08 7:30 pm | Hempfield at Cedar Crest | 47 61 | League |
| 1/10 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at Penn Manor | 70 40 | League |
| 1/11 3:00 pm | Cedar Crest Bishop McDevitt at Manheim Central | 58 55 | Nonleague |
| 1/14 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at McCaskey | 48 62 | League |
| 1/17 7:30 pm | Manheim Township at Cedar Crest | 49 58 | League |
| 1/22 7:30 pm | Carlisle at Cedar Crest | 43 56 | Nonleague |
| 1/24 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at Hempfield | 56 51 | League |
| 1/28 7:30 pm | Penn Manor at Cedar Crest | 52 65 | League |
| 1/31 7:30 pm | McCaskey at Cedar Crest | 52 53 | League |
| 2/04 7:30 pm | Cedar Crest at Manheim Township | League |
| League | Overall | |||||||
| W | L | PCT | W | L | PCT | PF | PA | |
| Cedar Crest | 11 | 1 | 0.917 | 19 | 2 | 0.905 | 1196 | 985 |
| McCaskey | 9 | 3 | 0.750 | 13 | 6 | 0.684 | 1294 | 1109 |
| Manheim Township | 6 | 6 | 0.500 | 11 | 8 | 0.579 | 1074 | 978 |
| Hempfield | 4 | 8 | 0.333 | 5 | 15 | 0.250 | 897 | 1027 |
| Penn Manor | 3 | 10 | 0.231 | 8 | 12 | 0.400 | 971 | 1111 |
| AAAAAA | School | W | L | T | Rating | TWP | OWP | TWPW | OWPW | TWPL | OWPL |
| 1 | Wilson | 19- | 1- | 0 | 0.841476 | 0.967949 | 0.686898 | 22.7 | 299.4 | 0.8 | 136.5 |
| 2 | Cedar Crest | 18- | 2- | 0 | 0.769432 | 0.930736 | 0.572282 | 21.5 | 239.5 | 1.6 | 179.0 |
| 3 | Central York | 17- | 3- | 0 | 0.769320 | 0.892070 | 0.619292 | 20.3 | 259.7 | 2.5 | 159.7 |
| 4 | Cumberland Valley | 17- | 3- | 0 | 0.759426 | 0.902597 | 0.584438 | 20.9 | 238.1 | 2.3 | 169.3 |
| 5 | Reading | 13- | 5- | 0 | 0.751770 | 0.803665 | 0.688344 | 15.4 | 265.2 | 3.8 | 120.1 |
| 6 | Central Dauphin | 14- | 5- | 0 | 0.735231 | 0.818402 | 0.633579 | 16.9 | 262.7 | 3.8 | 151.9 |
| 7 | J P McCaskey | 13- | 5- | 0 | 0.734367 | 0.803483 | 0.649892 | 16.2 | 271.9 | 4.0 | 146.5 |
| 8 | Warwick | 15- | 4- | 0 | 0.725110 | 0.846154 | 0.577167 | 18.2 | 236.4 | 3.3 | 173.2 |
| 9 | Governor Mifflin | 13- | 7- | 0 | 0.714175 | 0.741706 | 0.680525 | 15.7 | 297.9 | 5.5 | 139.9 |
| 10 | Harrisburg | 12- | 6- | 0 | 0.703359 | 0.764398 | 0.628755 | 14.6 | 254.3 | 4.5 | 150.2 |
| 11 | Central Dauphin East | 11- | 6- | 0 | 0.689117 | 0.737265 | 0.630268 | 13.8 | 259.5 | 4.9 | 152.2 |
| 12 | Chambersburg Area | 13- | 6- | 0 | 0.685641 | 0.772397 | 0.579606 | 16.0 | 233.9 | 4.7 | 169.7 |
| 13 | Manheim Township | 11- | 8- | 0 | 0.664659 | 0.684755 | 0.640097 | 13.3 | 264.2 | 6.1 | 148.6 |
| 14 | Dallastown | 12- | 8- | 0 | 0.654282 | 0.687500 | 0.613681 | 14.3 | 264.7 | 6.5 | 166.6 |
| 15 | Exeter Township | 10- | 9- | 0 | 0.628293 | 0.619178 | 0.639433 | 11.3 | 272.8 | 7.0 | 153.8 |
| 16 | Lebanon | 11- | 10- | 0 | 0.602824 | 0.621749 | 0.579693 | 13.2 | 247.5 | 8.0 | 179.5 |
| 17 | Waynesboro Area | 10- | 9- | 0 | 0.575811 | 0.588859 | 0.559862 | 11.1 | 235.5 | 7.8 | 185.1 |
| 18 | Penn Manor | 8- | 12- | 0 | 0.552557 | 0.508108 | 0.606884 | 9.4 | 259.2 | 9.1 | 167.9 |
| 19 | Red Lion | 8- | 11- | 0 | 0.546778 | 0.498615 | 0.605644 | 9.0 | 251.1 | 9.1 | 163.5 |
| 20 | Carlisle | 6- | 14- | 0 | 0.526733 | 0.413408 | 0.665242 | 7.4 | 280.1 | 10.5 | 141.0 |
| 21 | HEMPFIELD | 5- | 15- | 0 | 0.491347 | 0.340000 | 0.676327 | 6.0 | 297.6 | 11.6 | 142.4 |
| 22 | Conestoga Valley | 5- | 14- | 0 | 0.464048 | 0.333333 | 0.623811 | 5.6 | 272.2 | 11.1 | 164.2 |
| 23 | York County School Of Technology | 4- | 14- | 0 | 0.312617 | 0.208791 | 0.439515 | 3.8 | 168.4 | 14.4 | 214.8 |
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