Feb 17, 2026 By Joe Smeltzer 3 min read

McDONALD – Fort Cherry’s girls basketball team didn’t get off to the start it wanted.

It turns out, not giving up a point for the entire second quarter was a good cure to this.

No. 4 Fort Cherry allowed 15 points in the first quarter of its first-round WPIAL playoff matchup against No. 13 Riverview.

It allowed nine the rest of the night, cruising to a 55-24 win Tuesday night.

“We normally come out a little slow,” Fort Cherry coach Clarence Edwards said. “I think it’s just the jitters. A playoff game, first-round at home, we had a good crowd… we had to settle down.”

Settle down, they did.

Finally, with 6:17 left in the third quarter, Riverview (10-8) scored again, ending a drought that felt like it started during the previous presidential administration.

But by this point, Fort Cherry (16-5) was up by 18 and well on its way.

By the end of the third quarter, FC led by 30.

Leading the way for the Rangers was Gianna Bianchini, a sophomore guard who ended the night with 20 points- only four fewer than Riverview’s entire team.

Bianchini’s game was more than scoring.

She also had 10 steals and nine assists, just missing a triple double.

So what was working?

“Definitely my 3s,” Bianchini said. “I started driving more, which I don’t usually do as much, but my 3s were on tonight, when sometimes they’re on and off.”

“G is just G,” Edwards said with a laugh. “When she knocks down one, she’s in her rhythm. She had her feet set, had a good stroke going on. I mean, she was just feeling it tonight. When she feels it, we let her go.

Fort Cherry got off to a slow start, trailing 11-8 in the first four minutes. The Rangers got it together to end the quarter on an 11-4 run, and Gianna Bianchini scored the first seven points in the second quarter to open up a double-digit lead. That lead ballooned to 18, with Riverview not scoring for the entire second quarter.

Brooke Cornali added 16 points and 12 rebounds for Fort Cherry, and Emily Pfnder added 11 and 7.

Fort Cherry will now take on the winner of No. 5 Rochester in the quarterfinals.

The Rangers played Rochester earlier this season and cruised to a 63-31 win. But Fort Cherry also had starting post player Allison Litman available for that game, and Litman is now out with an injury.

To keep playing beyond Friday, Edwards knows getting off to a fast start and beating “the jitters” are key.

“It’s tough,” he said. “When you have only two seniors on your team, two juniors, everybody else is sophomores. A lot of sophomores haven’t been in this position, so it makes it tough. It doesn’t matter what level you’re at. At the end of the day, when you have a big crowd, you get nervous when it comes to the playoffs because you want to do your best, but you’re so hyped up.”

“They have to get used to it. That’s all it is. They have to get used to it, because the games are going to get harder and harder.”