The first weekend of December marks the start of high school basketball season, for me personally it marks the start of year #36 on the mic at McCaskey. Friday was the first night of a weekend tipoff tournament at JPM, I was able to be present since the Royals had played the night before. In the evening's first game Warwick (our old friends from Lititz) defeated Chichester (from suburban Philadelphia), in the nightcap the Red Tornado lost to Coatesville 77-55. We were up 18-11 after one quarter, from there Coatesville kicked it into another gear and JPM couldn't keep up. There is a reason why we have always played a challenging non-league schedule, it's about learning from the experience and finding out how good you really are. Eleven players were in uniform, they all played and eight got into the scoring column. Jared Kumah (back at JPM from a year at prep school in Florida) led with 21, Cesar Peguero had 12, Kamryn Pugh added six, DeAndre Jones had five, Aiden Burgess scored four points, Nemias Tirado nailed a three-ball, Kaiden Russel and Ja'Loney Porter had a field goal each. The tournament continued on Saturday, the day started with the JPM JV squad losing its season opener to Warwick. In the consolation game McCaskey pulled even at 1-1 with a win over Chichester, Coatesville defeated Warwick for the championship. All of that happened in my absence, I was back at the Arena for the back end of the Royals two-game set with Kalamazoo. On this night the Royals atoned for the Thursday loss with a spirited 5-3 win. Matt Brown gave the Good Guys a 1-0 lead in the first period, in the second the K-Wings scored two goals in twenty-three seconds to go up 2-1. Midway through the period the Royals replied accordingly, scores from Tag Bertuzzi and Devon Paliani separated by ninety-four seconds of clock time put the Royals ahead 3-2 at the intermission. Joseph Nardi lit the lamp early in the third to make it 4-2 but the Wings didn't fly away without a fight, they scored with two minutes left to draw within one. Tag Bertuzzi's empty-netter in the final seconds nailed down the win for goaltender Nolan Maier, after the final horn emotions boiled over and two men on each club were penalized for their involvement. The record stands at 5-10-2 (4-3-1 at home), the Royals host Trois-Rivieres for a two-gamer starting on Friday the 8th. Sunday a dark and rainy day, in late afternoon the McCaskey football team held its annual awards assembly at a local dining hall. It lasted for about two hours with a good meal included. Take care, thanks for reading.
