Feb 18, 2007 By Bobby Fox 4 min read

JEFFERSON HILLS – Every team welcomes a nice long scoring run to open a playoff game. Sewickley Academy had one of those runs during their opening round Class A playoff game against Carmichaels… it was called the first quarter. The Panthers used a stifling press and a nearly flawless offensive attack to outscore the Mikes 21-0 in the opening period and rode it to a 64-35 victory in Saturday afternoon’s matchup at Thomas Jefferson High School.

“I think that we were a little overwhelmed at first. Things just started snowballing, and it got away from us,” Carmichaels coach Don Williams said of the disastrous opening period. “I’ve seen them in the past and that’s that jumping switch man-to-man. We couldn’t handle it.”

Along with a stifling defense, the Panthers showed off a highly disciplined, quick-moving offense in which all five players contributed. During the first quarter, all five starters scored. That balance and a focus on fundamentals is what coach Win Palmer said is the key to his team’s success.

“Everything we do is about jump stops and ball fakes, taking charge and boxing out, and we’re very fortunate that we have very unselfish kids,” Palmer said. “They believe in fundamentals and in spite of the youth in our team we’ve been able to get better.”

The Mighty Mikes finally got on the board 26 seconds into the second period when Ian McCombs managed to lay two points in. However, Carmichaels managed just 10 points before halftime and trailed 39-10 at the break.

Instead of throwing a tantrum at his players, Williams challenged them to play hard and try to learn from a team that was clearly ahead of where they were as far as their development.

“They were a very sound, fundamental team and we knew that coming in,” Williams said. “They play a lot of basketball and you can tell. They can all handle the ball; they could all put it on the floor and they could shoot it. That’s something we should strive for.”

After Sewickley increased the lead to 57-20 after the third, the Mikes were able to outscore the Panthers 15-7 in the final period.

Though they made it look very easy, Palmer and his players did not come into the game taking the Mikes lightly.

“We’ve been changing our game plan and trying to be aggressive,” Palmer said. “We saw Carmichaels on film in the last few games and they looked good. We figured if we let them get into a half court set, we could be in trouble.”

Once the dust settled from the blowout, the Panthers had five players with at least eight points. Leading the way was 6-5 senior forward Mike Kalis who rolled up a game-high 19 points.

Many of the Carmichaels players were very familiar with the Sewickley big man as he dueled with the Mikes’ Joby Lapkowicz in a first round WPIAL baseball playoff game last season — a game the Mikes won.

Tom Droney added 10 for Sewickley and Bobby O’Donnell, Mike Jackson and Mike Dean chipped in eight points each.

Carmichaels was led by Lapkowicz who rolled up nine points. Jeremy Ganocy added eight and Bill Hyatt had seven.

Though his team was thoroughly defeated, Williams was still satisfied with how the 2006-2007 season went and is looking forward to the future of his program.

“I think the season ended up well for us for as young as we were,” Williams said. “I think the kids played hard and they learned from this. They had a very good season for how many juniors and sophomores we played.”

Sewickley Academy will face Clairton, which beat Geibel 59-44, in the quarterfinals.