December 13-14

Tuesday evening hoops at JPM as the Red Tornado hosted Chester. Steve Powell is a Chester alum from the class of '68, we've been playing them every year since he's been head coach at McCaskey. They are perennially one of the top programs in the state, all they did last year was win the state championship. On this night the JV game started twenty minutes late because Chester was late arriving and of course it went into overtime before McCaskey won it 53-51. That game by itself was worth the price of admission, I've always felt that a good JV game stokes the crowd for the varsity game to follow. In the main event of the evening Chester showed why they're the state champs as they downed McCaskey 71-61 in a game that was closer than the score would indicate. Eight players got in for JPM and seven of them scored, Diante Cherry had 18 and Calvert Gantz had 15. The game didn't start until 8:40 because of the JV OT, it wound down at 10:10. The loss drops the Red Tornado to 1-1 on the young season, league play begins on Friday with a divisional crossover game in Ephrata. On Wednesday night the McCaskey girls played their first home game as Reading High came to visit. I don't get to see the girls play often since most of their games coincide with when the boys play. Not a good night for JPM, the junior varsity lost by seven and the varsity game was uncompetitive from the word Go as RHS won by thirty. The girls begin their league slate on Friday as well with a home game against Ephrata. Take care, thanks for reading.