Basketball season must be upon us: The Harrisburg Patriot-News had its preseason state rankings in on Sunday.
Two (2) Lancaster-Lebanon League girls’ teams graced the first poll this season:
Lancaster Mennonite, the reigning District 3 Triple-A champ, is ranked eighth in Double-A (the Blazers bopped down a classification this season), and Lebanon Catholic, the reigning District 3 Single-A runner-up, is an honorable mention selection in Single-A.
Preseason No. 1’s are Cardinal O’Hara in Quad-A, Archbishop Carroll in Triple-A, York Catholic in Double-A and Bishop Guilfoyle in Single-A.
And yes, O’Hara and Carroll are in the Philadelphia Catholic League, whose teams will be eligible for PIAA playoffs for the first time this season. Not sure about you, but I know I’m anxious to get a load of some of those teams live and in person.
You can find the entire girls’ state rankings by following this link.
Less than a week to go before the openers. Here are some L-L League girls’ basketball news and notes to get you in hoops mode …
NOT AN EASY OPENER – Tough draw for reigning Section 3 champ Lampeter-Strasburg in the first round of the Columbia Tip-Off Tournament on Friday night. The Pioneers get Mid-Penn power Central Dauphin East in the first round. CDE went 23-8 overall and is an honorable mention pick in the Patriot-News Quad-A preseason poll. CDE advanced to the PIAA quarterfinals last season, after falling to Wilson in the District 3 Quad-A championship game. If L-S survives that game, it would get the winner of host Columbia against Hempfield. If L-S and Hempfield win on Opening Night, the Tip-Off Tournament final would be a rematch of last season’s L-L League quarterfinal, won by Hempfield, 40-27.
VANDY HEADING NORTH – One L-L League girls’ basketball player has already signed on the dotted line with an NCAA Division 1 program: Lancaster Mennonite senior guard Katelyn Vanderhoff, a three-sport standout who helped the Blazers win Section 4 and the District 3 Triple-A crown last winter, accepted a full ride from the University of Maine.
MILESTONE ALERT – Hempfield coach Lenny Groft needs 20 victories for 300 in his career. … Lebanon coach Carlos Sanchez needs 19 victories for 200 in his career. … McCaskey coach Brian McCloud needs 14 victories for 100 in his career.
SPEAKING OF COACHING – Here are the top 10 active winningest coaches in the L-L League …
Lamar Kauffman, Lancaster Catholic (27th season; 623-148).
Patti Hower, Lebanon Catholic (31st season; 566-274).
Dave Meyer, Elco (19th season; 321-143).
Lenny Groft, Hempfield (15th season; 280-104).
Carlos Sanchez, Lebanon (12th season, 181-114).
Brian McCloud, McCaskey (5th season; 86-31).
Lance Wagner, Manheim Township (7th season; 70-72).
Jerry Beekler, Conestoga Valley (7th season; 69-79).
Sherri Gorman, Lancaster Mennonite (4th season; 59-24).
Matt Reber, Warwick (6th season; 53-65).
I have to dig around this winter and see where Kauffman’s wins rank across the state. I only know of one girls’ coach with 700 or more wins, but there certainly could be more. When I find that info, I’ll be sure to pass it along. And no, this will not be Kauffman’s final year. Let me get that out of the way in the first notes’ column this season.
CLOSING IN ON ONE GRAND – Three L-L League players should join the 1,000-career-point club fairly early this season:
Lisa Boyer, senior, L-S – 939 points.
Katelyn Vanderhoff, senior, Lancaster Mennonite – 896.
Nicky Hess, senior, Donegal – 912.
No active L-L League players have 1,000 or more points.
And be sure to check out my L-L League girls’ basketball 1,000-career-point list by following this nifty little link.
WELCOME ABOARD – Just one new head coach in L-L League circles this season … Richard Kohler is calling the shots at Cocalico. He replaced Shawn Martin, who spent just one season on the Eagles’ bench, going 6-17 last season.
MARK YOUR CALENDAR – Never too early along to pass along some dates for you: The last night of L-L League play is Feb. 4, 2009, with the league playoffs slated to start the week of Feb. 9.
Last season the girls’ playoffs were M-W-F and the boys’ playoffs were T-TH-S. I thought they said they were going to flip-flop that this year, so that would make the girls’ playoffs Feb. 10, Feb. 12 and Feb. 14. Title game would be that Saturday.
I was told that once again the finals will be played in a local gym. That Giant Center contract has been shredded. Which is fabulous, I say. Last season’s finals in Manheim Township’s new gym were a huge success.
Since 2009 will be an odd year on the calendar, the L-L League girls’ playoff brackets will look a little something like this … TOP: Section 2 champ vs. Section 3 runner-up; Section 4 champ vs. Section 1 runner-up; BOTTOM: Section 3 champ vs. Section 2 runner-up; Section 1 champ vs. Section 4 runner-up.
Anyone else getting sick of the Section 1 champ against the Section 4 runner-up … year after year after year after year after year.
Gotta be a better way to set up the league playoffs, and every year everyone sits around and complains about it … and of course it gets back to me. And I write something about it or blog something about. And nothing ever seems to get done. Last I was told, the L-L League coaches are more than welcome to approach the front office with ideas about aligning the sections and changing the playoff brackets. But all sides (boys and girls) must be in agreement. And that, friends, will never, ever happen. So everyone is stuck with this format, at least for the foreseeable future.
ONE LESS GAME – Because the PIAA is in such a big hurry to get everyone’s district playoffs started earlier, all schools had to bag a game this season. The max number of games permitted is 22 – down from 23 last year. I think (think) that you can have a 23rd game in the bag if you don’t make Districts. Not positive about that. But several teams had a 24th game bagged the last few years. Didn’t hear if that was still OK.
CROSSING OVER – The first night of league play is Friday, Dec. 12 … and just for yucks, the league games start with the always popular crossovers. Yeah, I was kidding. I haven’t talked to one coach yet who really likes the crossovers.
The first Friday, Tuesday and Friday games are crossovers, followed by real, live section games on Tuesday, Dec. 23 … the last league night before the Christmas hiatus. League play starts up again on Friday, Jan. 2 with section games. … The final round of crossover games are Jan. 13, Jan. 16 and Jan. 20.
REINHART’S PICKS – I’ll probably get a little more in-depth about this in a near-future post, but as of Sunday, Nov. 30, I’m leaning Cedar Crest in Section 1, Garden Spot in Section 2, Lampeter-Strasburg in Section 3 and Lancaster Mennonite in Section 4. Not sure which way I’ll be leaning when I write the actual pick column. But as I sit here typing this, those are my picks. As far as you know.
ETC – Tons more to come with the preseason girls’ stuff. I’ll be posting full capsule previews on each team (probably by section to save a little space). I’ll also do a full prediction column. I’ll probably do a preseason All-Star team (or teams). And I’ll probably throw together a Reinhart’s Rankings of my top 5 heading into Opening Night. Oooh, this is getting good. Basketball. Gyms. Whistles. 3-point lines. Foul shots. I can’t wait.
