Mar 1, 2007 By Rob Burchianti 5 min read

CANONSBURG – Three. Two. And now … one.

That’s the amount of fingers Albert Gallatin senior Jawaan Alston has held up at the end of the Colonials’ three playoff victories. After scoring a game-high 19 points to help Albert Gallatin battle its way to a 42-38 win over Pine-Richland in the WPIAL Class AAAA semifinals on Wednesday night, Alston put the single digit up.

One more victory for a WPIAL championship.

“After every one of our playoff games I put up fingers to show how many more we need to go,” said Alston, whose clutch basket with 2:14 left gave AG the lead for good.

“One more game to go.”

The ninth-seeded Colonials (21-6) will meet second-seeded Bethel Park, a 55-44 winner over third-seeded Fox Chapel in the other semifinal, on Saturday at the A.J. Palumbo Center.

No one can say Albert Gallatin hasn’t earned the right to play for its first WPIAL title. It has shown it can win any style of game.

After cruising over North Allegheny in the first round, the Colonials hit their highest point total of the season in knocking off No. 1 Moon, 80-73, in the quarterfinals.

On Wednesday night at Canon-McMillan High School – the same site of its upset over Moon – Albert Gallatin showed it could win a physical, slow-paced, low-scoring game as well.

“I thought there was no way we’d win this game if it was in the 40’s,” AG coach Dan Andria said. “I guess you can say we beat them at their own game.”

Rams coach Dave Krakoff agreed.

“We got the tempo we wanted,” Krakoff said. “We wanted to control the flow of the game, and we did. I give them credit. Alston made a couple huge shots for them.

“I thought we really defended well overall. We knew Alston would get his points, so we thought if we could hold everyone else down, we’d have a good shot to win. I thought Brian Felker did a good job on Alston, too, but he still made some really tough shots.”

Alston finished with 11 rebounds, four steals and two assists to go with his 19 points. No one else hit double figures for AG. Jake Magerko, who swished two pressure free throws with 18.2 seconds left to seal the win and set the final score, followed with seven points. Marc Marshall added five and Anthony Stevenson tallied four off the bench.

Brett Matson had held the hot hand for Pine-Richland in the playoffs, but he was limited to nine points on 4-of-24 shooting, although he contributed nine rebounds, three steals and two assists. Felker was the only Ram to hit double figures with a pair of 3-pointers in scoring 14 points, but only two came after halftime.

Albert Gallatin’s Nate Turner and Aaron Cromwell, who each scored 17 points in the win over Moon, were limited to three and two points, respectively, against the Rams.

Still, several Colonials made big shots when they needed them.

The game was tied 13-13 after one period and the Colonials held a 25-24 lead at halftime.

The Rams (18-8) came out hot in the second half, however, scoring the first five points to go up 29-25. Pine-Richland took its biggest lead of the game when Tommy Johnson hit a jump shot to make it 35-29, forcing Andria to call a time out at the 2:14 mark of the third period.

“I didn’t want the lead to get up to eight,” Andria said. “Being down eight to a team like that is like being down 15 to some other teams.”

The Colonials responded.

Cromwell grabbed an offensive rebound and hit a jumper for his only bucket of the game, and Alston then came up with a steal that led to a driving bank shot by Stevenson to pull AG within 35-33 heading into the final period.

Alston banked in a shot from in close to tie it at 35-35, but a nice tip-in by Felker put the Rams back in front.

Pine-Richland continued its methodical play on offense, but the Colonials’ defense stepped up when it had to in the closing minutes. The Rams were held to three points in the final frame.

“I think they really wanted it and they picked it up on defense,” Andria said.

“They’re athletic and they help each other out so well on defense,” Krakoff said. “We didn’t hit big shots when we needed to, but they certainly made it tough on us.”

A free throw by Turner cut the gap to one point, then Alston’s driving basket gave Albert Gallatin its first lead since the start of the second period.

“That put us over the hump,” Andria said. “My assistant coach Bill Broda was telling me the way this game is going the next 4-0 run is going to win it, and he was right.”

Magerko followed with the shot of the game. The senior guard drove to the basket and kissed a bank shot high off the glass and in to put the Colonials in front 40-37.

Eric Duerr, the Rams’ 6-foot-8 center who scored eight points, hit one of two foul shots to pull Pine-Richland within one point with 1:13 left.

Cromwell missed the front end of a one-and-one with 44.1 seconds left, but AG’s defense clamped down. Matson tried to drive the baseline, was cut off by Alston and then forced into an errant pass that went out of bounds with 19.3 seconds left.

Albert Gallatin inbounded the ball to Magerko, who put the game away at the free throw line.

“We’re not really shocked,” Turner said of his team’s run through the playoffs. “We’re not satisfied yet.

“We want to win a WPIAL championship, and we know we can do it.”