January 23-24

Jenny had another emergency babysitting call from her friend on Thursday, I took her home on Saturday morning and we had lunch along the way. At 2:30 the basketball team boarded the bus at McCaskey for another miserable bus ride, the destination this time was Central Dauphin East HS in suburban Harrisburg. Within the boundaries of Dauphin County there are high schools called Upper Dauphin, Lower Dauphin, Central Dauphin and Central Dauphin East, a discerning map-viewer would note that CD East is actually a few miles southWEST of CD. Either way it's about a forty-mile ride which is no fun in a school bus even if it is just about all highway travel. In recent seasons CDE has become a regular non-league opponent, in 2017 and '18 we played them in a showcase event at Reading HS. In 2019 that event was canceled by weather, our game was eventually played at CDE as the last game of the season. In 2020 weather was a factor AGAIN and on this occasion we played the makeup date at home because (a) fair is fair and (b) Freddy wanted no part of another trip to CD East after the jobbing we took there the previous year. It's well-known that when you play certain non-league opponents in their gym (especially in the league CDE plays in) you're not likely to get an equitably-officiated game, we've seen it too many times. On this late afternoon/early evening in Colonial Park the JV squad fell to 1-4 as they continue to play undermanned, in the varsity game we played well but lost 48-43. In fairness we'll point out that the officiating was not a huge factor, it wasn't great but it wasn't why we lost either. The coaches were largely satisfied with the effort, the guys fought all the way but just didn't get the big break. Hasan Williams led with 16, Jonathan Byrd and Sam Hershey scored ten each. Javonzee Washington hit a three-point goal, Jayon Burnside and Jared Kumah rounded out the book with two points each. We were back in town before 9:00, on a cold and windy night I was more than happy to get inside, take a hot shower and call it a weekend. The boys look to pull back to .500 overall  at home versus Manheim Township on Tuesday the 26th. Take care, thanks for reading