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J-M beats West Greene to clinch playoff spot

4 min read

ROGERSVILLE – The fans wearing blue and gold rose to their feet in the gymnasium. West Greene’s players approached head coach Jim Romanus and peered up at the scoreboard.

It was the end of the third quarter and the Pioneers trailed by only one point. With Rick Sonneborn being honored at halftime and Senior Night for the school’s winter sports programs, a large crowd was on hand to witness the Pioneers inch closer to the playoffs.

The celebration was in full swing, but Jefferson-Morgan did everything it could to wreck the party. The Rockets shut out the Pioneers in the fourth quarter and made nine of 12 free throws during that stretch to defeat West Greene, 49-33, in a Section 3-A game.

The victory lifts Jefferson-Morgan (5-5, 10-9) into the WPIAL playoffs for the first time since 2013 and leaves the Pioneers (4-7, 7-14) wondering what could have been. The Rockets could take third place in the section with a victory over Geibel Catholic tonight.

“I could say the word playoffs, but I’m not going to do that,” Jefferson-Morgan head coach Dennis Garrett said with a grin. “We are going to take it one game at a time. The last five or six have been playoff games for us.”

West Greene trailed throughout the second half, but gained the lead late in the third quarter on a baseline three-pointer by senior Bray Jackson, who finished with 10 points. The shot gave the Pioneers a 31-30 advantage with less than three minutes left in the quarter.

Rockets senior guard Nick Gustovich quickly helped J-M regain the lead with a three-pointer and senior Rece Henneman, who scored a game-high 13 points with eight rebounds, made one foul shot with 43 seconds left as Jefferson-Morgan held a 34-32 lead.

Pioneers sophomore Craig Weaver made one free throw with 30 seconds remaining to draw West Greene to within one and eight minutes away from ending the program’s playoff drought.

It unraveled from there. West Greene committed five turnovers in the fourth quarter and missed its two free throw attempts. On the other hand, Jefferson-Morgan made nine free throws, including four by Henneman and four by senior Austin Clark, who added 10 points, as the Rockets clinched the victory.

“We just wanted it more,” Henneman said. “Last year, they beat us late in the season and we weren’t going to let that happen again.”

Three Pioneers players fouled out and Jefferson-Morgan’s aggressive zone defense clogged passing lanes, making it difficult for West Greene to find Jackson on the perimeter.

“We didn’t score a point in the fourth quarter,” West Greene head coach Jim Romanus said. “We just don’t score enough to win. I thought we had a few good looks, but they just didn’t go down.”

The shots were falling for both teams in the first quarter as West Greene’s Kolton Rush, who scored a team-high 12 points, gave the Pioneers a 6-4 lead with 3:12 remaining in the quarter.

The Rockets made four three-pointers in the first eight minutes to take a 15-13 lead. Henneman started the second quarter with a smooth drive and lay-in, before West Greene answered with a 6-0 run to take the lead – its last for almost nine minutes. J-M’s Dylan Davis and Jalen Torres answered to give the Rockets a 22-19 lead at halftime.

The fans from each side of the gym roared with each shot falling, but in the end, the Pioneers could not overcome a mistake-filled fourth quarter and Jefferson-Morgan, which has struggled from the free throw line all season, made its shots when they counted the most.

“We got some lucky breaks,” Garrett said. “The breaks went both ways, but both teams played hard. We just happened to be better tonight. We did what we had to do to win. You can only play on emotion for so long. You have to dig deep, play and perform. We’re not looking forward. We know what we need to do as a team.”

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