Knoch boys basketball senior guard Teegan Finucan dreamed of winning a championship with his friends long before he ever wore a varsity jersey. Finucan’s conversations in the lunchroom at elementary school were innocent notions of far-off glory.
The third-seeded Knights delivered Thursday night at Petersen Events Center, knocking off top-seeded Quaker Valley, 48-35, to claim the school’s first WPIAL Class 4A crown.
“We’ve been talking about it since forever,” Finucan said. “Vinny DeFelice, Derek (Lang) and I have been playing together since third grade. We always said we had a serious chance of winning a championship. We were young, so it didn’t feel real we could accomplish a goal at a young age. As we got older, we came to the realization that, ‘Man, we got it. We can do this.’ ”
Knoch winning on the big stage for the first time in school history isn’t the celebration of a Cinderella, out-of -nowhere championship story.
The Knights’ win was a culmination of a years-long journey featuring a group blessed with size who delivered on their potential. This was the Knights’ second appearance in the WPIAL final. Knoch lost to Moon in the 2004 championship game.
Roman DeFelice said Knoch (22-4) stuck together after what could have been a difficult offseason. The Knights were knocked out in the first round of the state playoffs by Cathedral Prep last year. Knoch then lost Jackson Bauman and Brody Bauman, who transferred to Moon after their dad, Alan, resigned as Knoch’s coach.
The Knights were able to find a more-than-suitable replacement in veteran coach Joe Lafko, who collected his 570th win against the Quakers.
“We put in a lot of hard work,” said DeFelice, who scored a game-high 13 points and had five rebounds. “I mean, from the end of the season last year, we had about a week off and we got right back into the gym. So it was just that work all summer. And then with the loss of the Baumans kind of bonded us tighter and we worked as a group and were able to pull one out.”
Knoch had to stick together as Quaker Valley (20-4) blitzed the Knights to end the first half. Quakers guard Harrison Kerley shook up the game with his outside shooting.
Kerley made four 3-pointers in the first half and finished with a team-high 12 points. He connected on back-to-back treys to kick-start a run in the second quarter.
Zach Washington followed with a jumper to give Quaker Valley its first lead, 18-16, and capped an 8-0 run with 2:10 left in the half.
Quakers coach Mike Mastroianni was happy with how his team handled Knoch’s size.
“I actually thought they weren’t as successful,” Mastroianni said. “I thought we did a good job. We’re not a big team, if you didn’t notice that. I thought we did a tremendous job. We gave up two really early and we were mad about that.”
The Quakers limited Knoch’s leading scorer, Finucan, to five points on 2-of-7 shooting. The Knights had only 19 points at halftime.
“They’re a bunch of older guys that have many years of experience,” Mastroianni said. “They have their all-time leading scorer and have three or four guys that are going to put a college uniform on. They are good.”
The Knights, who had a 36-12 edge in points in the paint, had to adjust to how physical the Quakers were playing. Despite Knoch being a bigger team, Quaker Valley wasn’t intimidated.
“We had to be more physical,” said Knoch forward Liam Avon, who finished with 12 points and nine rebounds. “We had to stop letting their physicality bother us and just stay together. We were arguing a little bit in the first half and at halftime, we really stuck together and pulled through in the second half.”
The Knights pulled away with an 11-0 run that spanned between the third and fourth quarters.
With the score tied 27-27, Avon and Derek Lang delivered layups to give the Knights the lead for good late in the third. Knoch scored the first seven points of the fourth quarter to put the game out of reach.
Lang also finished with 10 points and four rebounds for Knoch, while Kolton Johnson had a game-high 12 rebounds.
This is the second WPIAL championship for Lafko, who also guided Hampton to a title in 2009.
“This is what brings old guys like me back into coaching and keeps me going,” Lafko said.