LH faces rematch; Salvino goes for No. 701
There were two key numbers that came out of Tuesday’s PIAA openers for the Laurel Highlands and Belle Vernon boys basketball teams.
For the WPIAL champion Mustangs, it was 26, as in they’ve won all 26 of their games this season with their latest victim being visiting Elizabethtown, 55-33.
For the Leopards, it was 700, as in coach Joe Salvino notched his 700th career coaching win when Belle Vernon knocked off host Obama Academy, 73-51.
Both teams are in action again tonight with second-round games.
Laurel Highlands faces a rematch from the WPIAL playoffs when it meets Highlands (19-7) in a 7 p.m. Class 5A game at Norwin.
Belle Vernon (20-4) goes up against unbeaten WPIAL champion Quaker Valley (24-0) in a 6 p.m. Class 4A game at North Allegheny.
Salvino was happy to reach his milestone win with his current team.
“They were aware of it,” Salvino said. “I did mention that I’m coming up on 700 wins. When I first went to Belle Vernon, a lot of these kids were freshmen and I told them it would be nice for me to be able to do that with them because they’re a very special group to me.”
Salvino has now recorded 61 wins in four years at Belle Vernon after ringing up 639 wins in 34 years at Monessen.
Did he ever envision such an accomplishment when his coaching career began?
“No, I never did,” Salvino admitted. “In fact I never thought I’d be coaching for 38 years. I love doing it but I didn’t think I’d be here that long.
“I’m happy and glad to be mentioned with some other great coaches but, all-in-all, really it just means I’m getting old and I’ve been around for a long time.”
Salvino was quick to share credit for his record.
“This is something not just for me, it’s for all the players who’ve work so hard and all the coaches I’ve been associated with over the years,” Salvino said. “It’s more like a team thing than an individual thing to me.”
To get win No. 701, the Leopards will need a complete team effort against the Quakers, who defeated Hickory, 67-51, in the first round.
“Quaker Valley is the No. 1 team. There’s no doubt about it, we’ve got our work cut out for us,” Salvino said. “But you just never know. I’ve been involved in this a long time and I’ve lost some games we should’ve won but then I’ve won some games we probably should’ve lost. If we do what we have to do and things go our way … but we have to play four quarters of basketball. We can’t give up any quarters.”
Salvino hopes his Leopards can keep the Quakers, who feature a pair of talented 6-foot-5 stars in Adou Thiero and Markus Frank, off-balance.
“We’re going to try to mix things up as far as defenses are concerned to try to throw them off a little bit, maybe make them think a little bit more on what they have to do,” Salvino said. “Sometimes when you get a team in certain situations they’re not used to being in, they’ll try to rush or maybe you force them to do things they aren’t comfortable doing.”
Belle Vernon will again be without senior point guard Devin Whitlock. That didn’t matter in the win over Obama as Daniel Gordon scored 28 points and Quinton Martin added 22.
“When Daniel’s on his ‘A’ game he can shoot just as good as anybody,” Salvino said. “But I can’t just rely on Quinton and Gordon. Everybody who’s on the floor has to contribute someway, somehow.”
Belle Vernon is the fourth-place team out of District 7 (WPIAL) but that doesn’t mean the Leopards can’t make a run at the PIAA title, according to Salvino.
“When I won the two state championships (at Monessen), we didn’t win the WPIAL either year, we were a 7-3 (District 7, third-place team) going in,” Salvino pointed out. “If you get on a roll, then you start to get it into your mind that we can do this.”
Laurel Highlands’ magical season continues with their second game against the Golden Rams this postseason. The Mustangs beat Highlands in the WPIAL semifinals, 61-44, on Feb. 28 at Peters Township High School.
In that game, it was the usual trio of juniors leading the way for LH with Brandon Davis scoring 21 points and Rodney Gallager and Keondre Deshields following with 19 and 14 points, respectively.
However, in the win over Elizabethtown a new offensive threat emerged as senior Joe Chambers, with 18 points, became the first player all season not named Gallagher, Davis or Deshields to lead the Mustangs in scoring.
Highlands got a 25-point effort from Cam Reigard in its 74-46 first-round win over Brashear with Jimmy Kunst tallying 21 and Bradyn Foster adding 14.
Kunst led the Rams with 16 points in their first clash with LH and Foster totaled 14 points and 11 rebounds.
Tonight’s winners will play in the quarterfinals on Tuesday.