Shaler Area boys basketball heartened by 1st-round victory

By: Josh Rizzo
Friday, February 21, 2020 | 2:25 PM

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Any simmering problems the Shaler Area boys basketball team picked up during a rough stretch to end the season didn’t linger into the first round of the WPIAL Class 5A playoffs.

The Titans built a 14-point lead by halftime and moved past Gateway, 48-43, last Monday at North Hills.

Shaler (14-9) lost six of its final eight games entering the playoffs. Titans senior Chris White, who scored 10 points against the Gators, said Shaler had to refocus mentally.

“We had the physical down,” White said. “We were in the weight room. We did the skillset training. During the last few weeks, we got in each other’s heads too much. We’re trying to get better. Once we accepted that and everyone knew their role as team players, we got the ball rolling again.”

The Titans took on second-seeded Chartiers Valley in the quarterfinals last Friday in a game that ended too late for this edition.

Shaler coach Rob Niederberger believed the Titans wouldn’t fold once the playoffs started. How the schedule fell at the end of the regular season didn’t provide many opportunities for reflection.

Shaler played seven games in 15 days. When the Titans had a week off before the playoffs, they chose to avoid scrimmaging and instead focus on themselves.

“Some of those losses were tough losses. Then during the next practice you are preparing for the next opponent and not working on us,” Titans coach Rob Niederberger said. “When the regular season was over, we didn’t scrimmage or do any of that crap. We wanted to work on us.”

Shaler rediscovered the on-ball pressure that had helped drive its early offensive success. The Titans outscored Gateway, 28-14, in the first half.

Mekhi Reynolds led Shaler with 19 points, and Jake Miller added 10.

“We knew if we could pressure them on defense, we could turn it into offense,” White said.

Adapting to a variety of gameplans isn’t something Niederberger senses will stop soon.

The Titans feel they faced enough adversity in January to keep it from weighing them down in February.

“We’re resilient. It shows where the program has come,” Niederberger said. “To lose like that, when I first got here, we would have been done. We have started to win and get used to winning. I don’t think there was ever a stretch where I thought we were going to fall part and lose in the first round.”

Tags: Shaler