With Saturday Looming, Lancaster Mennonite Passes Early Playoff Test As Blazers Top Conestoga Valley In Battle Of Section Champions

Written by: Andy Herr on February 3, 2026

While it may not necessarily be all that common to be seen around these parts, the fact of the matter was that this season, as wonky and as crazy as its been inside the Lancaster-Lebanon League boys’ basketball landscape all year long, this year has already seen 75% of the section championships be decided and set into stone with more than a week left on the regular season slate. Fittingly, seeing as how this week marks the official start of the league playoffs which will get commence in earnest on Saturday, Monday night offered a playoff preview of sorts, albeit with a matchup that wouldn’t come to pass a second time unless it were to come inside the league championship game itself next Thursday night at Manheim Township.

For both Conestoga Valley and Lancaster Mennonite, there were more than enough parallels to illustrate just how similar both the Buckskins’ and Blazers’ seasons have been inside conference play respectively. And that’s taking aside the roughly two-mile drive that separates the school’s campuses as well. Chief among them, the pair’s combined 19-1 total record against their fellow section brethren in Section Two and Section Four in totality this season, a staggering number that assuredly paved the way for both outfits to claim their divisional crowns without much in the way of drama.

But for Lancaster Mennonite in particular, a squad that routinely is forced to “schedule up” in hopes of seeing similar tests that the Blazers figure to encounter come the postseason, while this matchup might’ve not originally be intended to check off that same box a couple of years ago when this home-and-home series was contractually signed, rest assured that the Blazers took this test seriously once they took to their home floor on Monday night in this rare battle between two section champs outside of a playoff bracket. Part of the reason? The fact that Section Two’s runner-up, now since decided to be Warwick, pays a visit of their own to the Blazers’ house at noon on Saturday to help raise the curtain on the 2026 L-L League playoffs.

And if Monday night’s performance is to serve as any sort of indication, you can best believe that Mennonite will be up for that challenge – both on Saturday and beyond.

Once the ball tipped off on Monday night, it’d be hard to overstate just how impressive the Blazers, namely Chase Hurst, were in getting things underway. Specifically though, the Blazers’ tough-as-nails senior guard would proceed to tally the game’s first ten points all by his lonesome, a personal spurt which saw he and his squad race out to an early 10-0 margin against the Buckskins over the course of the first three minutes of play.

Yet while a Josiah Garcia bucket would stop the early bleeding for CV with a bucket at the tin which also awarded CV their first points of the evening following Hurst’s latest exploits, a Daulton Nolt fast break layup for Mennonite wasn’t far behind, a bucket which pushed the Blazers’ lead back up to ten, 14-4, with time winding down on a Mennonite-owned opening stanza.

And once it did, 18-4 score showing on the scoreboard and all, Chase Hurst had certainly made his imprint on the opening minutes seeing as how he himself had outscored the Buckskins’ troops single-handedly with Hurst already notching a baker’s dozen.

Gradually though, bit by bit, Conestoga Valley had finally settled down and started to withstand the early storm.

While it might not have seemed like much at the time perhaps, a triple rained down by way of CV junior guard, Camryn Bair, proved significant in its own way seeing as how it had helped the Bucks get back within single figures at 20-11 with 6:40 left before half. From there, the gap would steadily be whittled down even further once another CV underclassman, Kylinn Noon, countered back with a pair of free throws which preceded a tough take to the tin afterwards, a four-point Noon-led rally by the sophomore that had then chopped the Blazers’ once impressive lead down to a much more modest 22-18 count with 3:20 left before the break.

Yet as he had consistently proven up until that point, Chase Hurst continued to be the riddle that Conestoga Valley just couldn’t quite solve.

In fact, following another deuce at the cup, two more en route to his scintillating 21-point first half performance, the Blazers had successfully withstood this timely CV rebuttal towards their early cushion by authoring a prompt 10-point rally over the course of the final three minutes and change throughout the second stanza as Hurst’s final bucket of the second quarter helped to vault the hosts into the locker room with ownership of the 32-25 advantage.

Then, picking up right where he and his teammates had left off, Chase Hurst and company continued to make life arduous for CV.

In fact, Hurst was able to raise the curtain on the third quarter himself with an old-fashioned three-point play on the Blazers’ first offensive trip out of the dressing room, an emphatic emotional swing which later paved the way for the Mennonite lead to creep upwards to 18 following a Brady Grau hoop plus the harm, making it a 45-27 Blazers’ lead with 5:08 left in the third and LMH well on their way towards running away and hiding.

Or so it appeared.

Considering that they too are section champions, expecting to see the Buckskins simply roll over and not offer back any sort of counterpunch seemed to be incredibly foolish to outright assume. Sure enough, just as they done in the period previous, Conestoga Valley gradually began warming to this fight once again by rallying back in kind.

And while it too might’ve seemed innocent and unassuming at the time perhaps, a key Carter Gehman trifecta nailed in the waning stages of the third quarter helped the Bucks claw back to within ten, 47-37, before that same deficit would hold firm come the start of the final act with each team adding one point better to their tally over the final minute, 48-38.

But if you’re looking for all the ultimate chess piece that ultimately helped to tilt this game in his team’s favor? Well, you probably already know where this conversation is heading.

Aside from his 31 points notched on Monday night, a new career-high for the newest member of the Lancaster Mennonite 1,000-point club, Chase Hurst’s points were just as loud as his plays in general littered inside this matchup against Conestoga Valley.

For if he wasn’t the scoring the ball himself – which he did to begin the fourth frame with yet another hoop at the cup – Hurst had no issues whatsoever with getting others involved, something best evidenced by his sweet dish inside to fellow senior, Bill Rothwein, as the experienced LMH tandem helped balloon the Mennonite lead back out to two touchdowns, 56-42, with Conestoga Valley yet again forced to trudge outward from a sizable hole.

Sure enough, that’s exactly what the Section Two champs brought with them to the table despite time now starting to wear thin against them.

In terms of this final Buckskins’ rally, it would largely get underway following a tough three-point play cashed in courtesy of Camryn Bair, a key burst which had then trimmed the Blazers’ lead back inside of single figures, 57-49, with 3:20 then left to play.

From there, the gap would first be sliced down to six roughly 20 seconds later at 57-51 following a hoop at the tin finished off by Carter Gehman, a 15-point performer for the Buckskins on this night, before a successful 2-2 trip to the charity stripe by way of CV junior guard, Jayden Conaway, chopped things down to a 62-57 difference with all of 68 seconds left outstanding.

However, even despite how valiantly they had fought tough-and-nail at trying to complete what would have a memorable comeback at various pockets all throughout Monday evening, that early gap, along with Mennonite’s timely answers, proved to be the eventual difference in deciding this outcome.

Well, that and timely foul shooting to be precise as the Blazers calmly sunk six freebies – two by way of Rothwein with another four compiled by Jackson Bare, finishing second in team-high scoring honors with 15 behind Hurst’s bucketing of a game-high 31 – helping to make it a firm and comfortable 70-60 Lancaster Mennonite lead with time winding down.

And while CV’s leading scorer in this one, Kylinn Noon, an 18-point scorer in his own right against Blazers, would sink a trifecta on the Bucks’ final trip down the floor, it was too little and far too late for this CV squad as Lancaster Mennonite took this makeshift playoff preview by prevailing with a 70-63 final verdict over Conestoga Valley as Section Four proved to get the better of Section Two, on this night at least.

Needless to say, especially best exemplified by the way in which they had come out of the chute, Lancaster Mennonite collectively had their eyes set on this game for quite some time.

“We knew were going to have to come out physical because we haven’t played a bigger school in a while. It’s basically been all section games lately,” the straw that stirs Mennonite’s drink, Chase Hurst, said following his career best game found against CV. “We were all really tired after the first quarter because we’re not used to playing Section Two-type basketball,” Hurst acknowledged. “But yeah, we definitely come out with a chip on our shoulder which lets us start off games with big leads which then kind of lets us play how we want…We know we have to start off quick to beat these types of teams that we want to beat.”

And while Mennonite does still have regular season business left to tend to first which comes in the form of a home game against Annville-Cleona on Wednesday night, one of those teams that Hurst is almost certainly referring to there are the Warwick Warriors, a Warriors’ squad that has been swept by the same team that the Blazers had just beaten and led wire-to-wire against on Monday. Even still, while this game almost certainly buoys Mennonite’s collective resolve even further heading into that Saturday first-round affair, the Blazers know that the basketball transitive property isn’t something that can exclusively rely upon.

“It definitely gives us confidence for sure,” said Hurst. “We know that we can beat anyone in the league if we’re playing at our best. Likewise, anyone can beat anyone on their best night in the L-L. If we play like that (against Conestoga Valley), that just gives us all the confidence in the world. Especially with it being Warwick. We’ve lost to them the last two years,” the senior said revisiting the last two years of the league playoffs which saw the Warriors end any potential Blazers’ trip to Manheim Township for the finale. “We’ve wanted that game for awhile.”

“We’re ready for it,” said Hurst of the looming matchup. “This game was definitely a step, and we needed this game right before. It was really good to have a game like this right before the L-L playoffs just because it gives us a whole lot of confidence.”

As for his head coach? While he too almost certainly sees this outcome as a net positive for his club – especially considering who the opponent that was sitting on the other bench – this is just another step in building towards what the Blazers hope is yet another memorable postseason ride.

“I still don’t think we’re where we need to be yet,” Lancaster Mennonite head man Jeff Hartenstine offered in the CV postmortem Monday night. “I think there’s still work to be done, but tonight was an awesome test. It was an awesome tune-up for them and us. (Conestoga Valley) competes hard and there was a feeling tonight going in that we were going to need our best,” said Hartenstine.

“Shipper is just such a good guy,” the Blazers’ coach offered of his Buckskins’ counterpart when asked how this game first came to pass, then remained on the schedule despite it potentially being damaging to CV, a 6A school, seen dropping a game against a foe half their size in class when describing 3A’s Mennonite. “I think you go to him and say, ‘Hey, let’s do this. It’ll be a good basketball game.’ There’s a lot of analytics that might have some people saying, ‘Should I do this? Should I not?’ I don’t think that even crosses his mind,” he added of Shipper. “He’s just an awesome dude.”

Speaking of “awesome dudes,” the Mennonite head man is certainly blessed and fortunate to have one suiting up for him too.

“You can’t say enough great things about him,” Hartenstine then said when asked to describe Chase Hurst. “We had a game earlier this year against Spring-Ford where he gets tackled, just a basketball play, but he lands on his wrist,” the Blazers’ coach said of Hurst when going back to the team’s season-opener against another 6A opponent that came back in November. “(Hurst) was out of most of the fourth quarter, the lead went the other way, then all of a sudden, he comes walking up to me and says, ‘Just put me back in. I’m ready to go.’ I don’t how he got back in that game. I don’t know how he didn’t miss games,” Hartenstine continued. “Against Unionville, their coach said something very flattering about him. He said, ‘You know, if (Hurst) was four inches taller, he’d be a Division 1 player.’ But yeah, he definitely makes us go. He’s tenacious, he doesn’t want to come out of games, and we love him. He’s awesome.”

But what might be even more “awesome” when describing this Mennonite bunch? While it’s true and obvious that the Blazers lean almost exclusively upon a host of the same five, six characters, Hartenstine knows that this is a group where everyone brings their own unique value to the team’s overall equation.

“We have a lot of guys on our bench that put in a ton of time,” Hartenstine explained. “When I call them to do something extra, put in some extra time with something, they do it. For the most part, when we play an O’Hara, a Chester, a game like tonight, some of those guys just aren’t going to get a ton of time. Those other games, those are the games where we make it a conscious effort to have those guys go in and compete.”

“I talked to the coaches, and I talked to my wife beforehand and just asked, ‘What are we trying to accomplish here? Are we hoping to accomplish winning some of these games by 20 to 40 points, or are we trying to accomplish getting everyone on the court when we have the opportunity to?’ You try to balance everything as much as possible because we’re trying to make sure we get guys (playing) time when we can because they’ve earned it,” said Hartenstine.

“I’m a father. I know that these kids want to play because I know my kids, whatever sport it is, they want to play. You come home as a parent and sit with them. For me, I gotta look and make sure I find time for everyone. If that means that some of the starters don’t play all that much, or some guys don’t score at all because they were in and out, then so be it.”

And that right there, beyond the up-front talents found in the likes of Chase Hurst, Jackson Bare, Bill Rothwein, Daulton Nolt, and Brady Grau, that might be the reason as to why this could indeed be a special postseason ride for Lancaster Mennonite. For no team wins any sort of championship if they aren’t all rowing in the same direction. For these Blazers, the 2025-26 edition, as Monday night laid to bare, that certainly seems to be case.

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