Decade’s best WPIAL finals: Boys basketball No. 7
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Friday, February 14, 2020 | 11:46 PM
New Castle’s Malik Hooker (23) and his teammates celebrate their 55-49 win in the WPIAL Boys Class AAAA basketball championship game against Hampton on March 1, 2014.
There were a lot of changes to the WPIAL basketball championships over the past 10 years.
They expanded from two days to three and from eight finals to a dozen championship games. The WPIAL also switched venues, moving from Duquesne’s Palumbo Center to Pitt’s Petersen Events Center.
Bigger and better has led to some fantastic championship moments over the course of the just-completed decade. So as we prepare for the first finals of the 2020’s, here is a look back with a countdown of the top 10 WPIAL boys and girls basketball championship games from the last 10 years.
Boys No. 7 – Stormy repeat
New Castle and Hampton were the dominant forces in WPIAL Class AAAA basketball in the middle of the decade.
New Castle rolled past Hampton, 68-53 in the 2013 WPIAL title game, and it was no surprise the top two seeds in the highest classification were going to crash into each other one more time in 2014.
The Talbots would finish the season with a record of 24-5 with four of those losses to the Red Hurricane, including this title-game thriller before a packed Palumbo Center that was part of a perfect 31-0 WPIAL and PIAA championship season for Ne-Ca-Hi.
Click below for HSSN’s Chris Harlan’s recap with photos.
Previous Top 10:
Girls No. 7 – Thrilling three-peat
Girls No. 8 – High flying Hawks
Tags: Hampton, New Castle
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