After wintry weather wreaked havoc with the schedule. the Solanco girls basketball team assumed it would have to wait a few extra days to clinch a section title and do so on the road. Thanks to a Lampeter-Strasburg loss Friday night, Mules were presented with a golden opportunity to claim the crown on their homecourt. They took full advantage. Solanco secured Lancaster-Lebanon League's Section Three championship with a 48-39 triumph over visiting Manheim Central Saturday afternoon. "It's very important for the school," Solanco coach Chad McDowell said. "It's very important for the community, our school community, our fans. It's not just about this team here now. It's about all the teams that I've been part of for the last five years. Those players who have graduated already helped lay the foundation for this. There's a great group of them who really built this program. This didn't happen overnight. This took five years of hard work, lots of summer work, hours in the weight room, hours on the court, hours doing fundamentals, hours running bleachers. It took a whole group to make it successful and a whole lot of hard work to make it successful."
It is the fourth section title in program history and the first since Solanco won three straight from 2010-12. "It definitely feels good knowing all the hard work has paid off and that we did it all for a reason," senior guard Kara McClune said. "We got our goal that we wanted." The Mules will open the Lancaster-Lebanon League Tournament Saturday at home against the winner of this Thursday's game between the Section Two runner-up and the Section Four second place finisher. Entering the week a game ahead of L-S, Solanco figured it needed victories in its last two league games to take the title. Last Tuesday's game against Cocalico and Thursday's game vs. Manheim Central were both postponed. The Cocalico game was rescheduled for Monday, February 4 and the Central game was first slated to be made-up last Friday, only to be pushed back another day because of more snow. Everything changed Friday night when Cocalico defeated Lampeter-Strasburg. "It was beneficial for us because we were able to win the championship here at home and not have to wait until next week to do it," McDowell said. "We were able to secure it on our homecourt, in front of our fans. It's just an absolutely awesome place to do it." Cocalico's win over L-S meant the Mules needed just one more victory. They got it Saturday against Central. "We thought L-S was going to beat Cocalico, that they had beat them before and probably were going to do it again," senior guard Jess Cabrera said. "So we had the mentality we had to win our last two games to take the section. Then, once they lost, we were like, 'Oh, my gosh!' Manheim Central is definitely a great team but we wanted to get the win so we could seal the deal." Initially showing no ill-effects from nine days between games, the Mules stormed out to leads of 7-0, 11-2, and 15-4. A three-point play by Aleksa Burger supplied Solanco with a 27-13 lead with 3:18 left in the second quarter. The pesky Central squad countered with an 8-0 spurt to get within six before Burger scored to start a string of six consecutive Mules points. "We had a real good start," said McDowell. "It wasn't necessarily a surprise. I knew we had that in us. But having the layoff we had and then to get that start was definitely beneficial for us. I knew at some point we would hit a lull. And we did have that in the middle quarters a little bit. Let them get back in, especially down toward the end. We struggled finding offensive rhythm, even defensive rhythm. It was difficult to do that because of the layoff. We hadn't been in the gym truly since Monday. We had a practice [Saturday morning] from 9-10, just to get everybody in the gym, get them shooting. But you could see the effects of having that time off. It took us a little bit of time to get back into our rhythm." Solanco led 33-23 at halftime and padded the cushion to 39-25 before a seven-point Central run. Paige Phillips then hit a clutch three-pointer with 1.5 seconds left in the quarter to restore the Mules' lead back to double digits. Cabrera knocked down two free throws to start the fourth and Burger followed with a basket. Centrtal closed to within nine and had five possessions to get even closer, but Kara McClune recorded a steal, Phillips had a block, and Central twice missed the front end of one-and-ones and misfired on a layup. Central made two free throws with 2:04 left but then missed two from the charity stripe. Cabrera capped the scoring with 40 seconds to go. Burger paced the Mules with 14 points. Cabrera contributed nine. Jade Eshelman scored all eight of her points in the first half, helping Solanco start strong. Grace Kreider chipped in six points and Phillips finished with five. Solanco celebrated the section title by cutting down the net. "Last year's experience was awesome, but to get over the hump this year and get the section championship is absolutely great for the program," said McDowell. "We were right there last year. L-S was ahead of us. We knew coming in we had to take care of them, and if we didn't take care of them, we wouldn't win a section championship. They were the defending section champs and for us to dethrone them we had to go out and beat them and we did that twice this year." After closing out the regular season with games against Cocalico and Warwick, postseason play begins this Saturday with the L-L tourney. "I feel very confident," Cabrera said. "I'm surrounded by a great group of girls and we all work together so well. If I'm off, somebody else is on…I think we can compete with any team and I have no worries going into the league playoffs." The Mules are already assured of a second straight berth in the District III tournament. Heading into the weekend, Solanco was second in the district power rankings. "I think we have to stay hungry and I know the girls want more games, play more basketball, and keep going as a team together," said McClune. Before chasing more goals, Solanco had a couple days to savor the section crown. "These past four years, working every summer, fall, every open gym, it means a lot to all of us," senior forward Mackenzie Gladfelter said. "It's a big thing. It's a big thing for all of us." Comments are closed.
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