Cocalico Turns To Its Roots As Eagles Get Defensive, Put Strong Second Half Effort Together Against Susquehannock En Route To Fifth Straight Victory To Advance To Garden Spot Holiday Tournament Championship
Written by: Andy Herr on December 28, 2023
Before we begin, let’s start off with a question, shall we? If we were to rewind and go all the way back to 2016, who is only team to win an L-L boys’ basketball section in the division where Lampeter-Strasburg resides other than the school with the initials of L-S outright? If you said the Cocalico Eagles, right you’d be.
In fact, you’d have to get familiar and cozy with that wild and wonky COVID-drenched 2020-21 season to find the occurrence when the group from Denver was able to claim the Lancaster-Lebanon League Section Three title outright against the Pioneers, by virtue of a clean sweep no less. And while there is plenty more behind that story, let’s all just save face and agree that we hope to never see a year quite like that ever again, especially with all the oddities that particular season came with. No, wait. I’m sorry. While I still have the floor, I have to stress that pressing Cocalico into the chore of having to beat Garden Spot (on the road mind you) down the final furlong of that season as a means to essentially “prove” they had already beaten L-S twice before to avoid a one game, do-or-die playoff against the Pioneers for the lone bid into the league tournament that year was arguably the wildest assignment that the COVID year showed us that hopefully never rears its head back up again.
Anyway, why bring up the past here in this space? Well, while those in prognosticating positions have no reason to really distrust and go against the machine down in Lampeter that is consistently churning out section titles like that of some sort of birthright here the last decade or so until proven otherwise, you’re always looking for an heir apparent to the throne. This year? Hey, maybe it’s time for Cocalico to make a go of it again.
Here, coming into the holiday break of the 2023-24 campaign, Cocalico was not just playing their best basketball throughout the season thus far, but they were also doing so in a manner that had the Eagles entering the holiday tournament smorgasbord as arguably one of the hottest L-L League boys’ going at the moment. Hard to really dispute that when you consider that the Eagles came into Garden Spot’s holiday tourney on Wednesday night while owning a 4-3 overall record with all four of their triumphs coming in successive fashion, something largely intertwined with all of their horses coming back into the fold following the reintegration of the football-playing members of the team following their second consecutive autumn of having reached the PIAA-5A state semifinals while out on the gridiron.
Now granted, if the first few weeks of the season have shown us anything at all, it’s that Section Three is incredibly deep and the miniscule margin of separation between the likes of L-S, Cocalico, Donegal, Octorara, and ELCO in particular is almost like that of dental floss. In short, if Cocalico were to enter the new calendar year fresh off a holiday tournament championship while down in New Holland with Garden Spot on hosting duties, that would figure to go a long way in establishing the Eagles as one of the prohibitive favorites to keep tabs on inside the Section Three dogfight over the next month and change.
That said, you must walk before you can run which in a basketball sense at this time and place meant that Cocalico needed to handle their business in the opening round of said tournament on Wednesday afternoon when they met up with the Susquehannock Warriors of the York-Adams League for the right to advance onto Thursday’s grand finale. And while they may have started off the game while trying to push through some the aftereffects of indulging in their fair share of Christmas cookies or something of the like, a undeniably strong second half performance that seemed to be the textbook definition of a Cocalico basketball masterpiece proved to be the eventual difference by the time the night was finally over with.
As mentioned though, Susquehannock undoubtedly took the fight to the blue and white in the early going on Wednesday.
In fact, after simply outhustling Cocalico for the spoils of three offensive rebounds to begin the contest, an early timeout prompted the Eagles to rehash the initial gameplan despite now staring up at a 4-0 deficit just 1:29 into the ballgame following an offensive rebound and stick back from Warriors’ junior guard, Brooks McKnight. Even still, Cocalico’s early hole would later grow outward in size and stature to a 7-0 count following a steal and layup by Susky 5’10 sophomore guard, Silas Leonard, with 4:13 left to play in the first by that point.
Finally, from that point however, Cocalico was warm to the fight that Susquehannock had brought to their doorstep.
Sure enough, on their ensuing offensive possession following the aforementioned Leonard theft and deuce, the Eagles were able to tally their first points of the evening courtesy of a coast-to-coast layup via 6’1 senior guard, Bryce Nash, before a 3-ball dialed up by another of the Cocalico guards, Timmy Hambright, made it a 7-7 contest following the 5’9 sophomore’s trey with 2:20 left in the opening stanza.
That said, even while Cocalico had retaliated the early 7-0 Warriors’ rally with a 7-0 rally of their own immediately thereafter, Susquehannock seemed undeterred regardless seeing as how the crew from Glen Rock came back with a 5-0 rebuttal of their own, capped off by a Jonathan Boampong trifecta, before Susky was able to carry the 12-9 lead with them into the second frame following a see-saw opening eight minutes of play.
Back and forth you say? Yep. Not even a brand-new quarter would deter many of those same elements between these two worthy adversaries.
In that regard, just when Cocalico was able to recapture control of the scoreboard at 13-12 on the heels of a nice steal and finish by way of 6’2 senior wing Connor Sala’s incredibly high motor that seemed to be running in tip-top shape all night long with 4:50 still left to play in the opening half, the Warriors rebuked that notion by promptly rattling off a 4-0 spurt of their own –capped off by a McKnight 3-ball—to make it a 16-13 Susquehannock lead with a shade over two minutes left to be played in the second by that juncture. Of course, no sooner did Susky have the lead than did they give it right back seeing as how a Sam Steffey triple –one of those key Cocalico football cogs mentioned earlier – vaulted the Eagles back into the lead at 18-16 with roughly 90 seconds left in the opening half.
All told, in a manner that seemed nothing if not apropos given how much of the opening 16 minutes seemed to play themselves out, a 3-ball dialed up in the waning moments of the second quarter thanks to the handiwork of Susky 6’4 senior wing, Manny Cartagena, sent both teams to their respective dressing rooms with the score deadlocked at 21-apiece following a topsy-turvy first two periods that saw both teams take turns throwing jabs at one another.
In the second half though, that’s when Cocalico eventually relied their overall DNA and makeup to dictate the terms on how this affair would eventually wrap itself up.
Sure enough, things couldn’t have started off for the Eagles’ contingent much better considering how Camden Ochs came out of the halftime locker room –newly implemented blue shooting sleeve and all– and proceeded to bury a trifecta to start things off before another Cocalico trey –this one from Tate Wealand—made it a six-point addition to the Cocalico cushion with their lead standing at that same margin given the 29-23 score with 5:30 still left to play in the third.
And while Susquehannock tried their best to try and remain within shouting distance as the third frame trudged along, such as when 6’2 junior guard Joe Fuller finished off a floater amongst traffic to make it a 31-25 ballgame, Cocalico was eventually able to rip off a timely 4-0 jaunt over the course of the final few minutes of the period to take the 35-26 lead with them into the final stanza.
But in the fourth quarter however? That’s where Cocalico eventually put their foot firmly on the gas pedal and didn’t do much in lieu of letting up.
Steadily, as they had already been doing throughout the final portions of the quarter previous, the Eagles were gradually building their lead upwards to the largest margins they had enjoyed all night long by that point. Case in point, a bucket underneath chipped in via 6’0 senior guard, Luke Main, which made it a ten-point Cocalico advantage, 40-30, with roughly five minutes left to go. Later, the group from nearby Denver would see their lead swell upwards to its largest of the evening, 14, at 44-30 following another bucket inside, this one from Camden Ochs who would go on to share team-high scoring honors alongside Bryce Nash with both chipping in a respectable 11-point evening amongst themselves, with just 3:30 left to be played by that stage of the game.
And while Susquehannock certainly did their part to make things far more interesting than those in the Cocalico camp would have certainly preferred inside of the final minute, especially once Brooks McKnight peppered in a pair of triples in successive fashion to trim the Eagles’ lead down to a 48-42 difference, Cocalico was able to get out of dodge once by the time the final buzzer rang as the Eagles were able to make it five victories in a row after withstanding a stern test from Susquehannock in the form of a 49-42 final verdict where they will now draw the hosts, Garden Spot, in Thursday’s title outing following the Spartans’ decisive victory over Hanover in the other semifinal round matchup.
“We’ll take every win we can get,” a businesslike Seth Sigman said following his team’s victory on Wednesday night after addressing his troops. “We treat it like every other game,” the Cocalico head man would then offer of this week taking place within the context of a tournament setting. “We’re trying to win. We’re not trying to do stuff we can’t do or things we aren’t good at. We’re trying to put our best guys out there and put them in the best positions as possible, so we’re not doing anything different in this kind of game as we would in any other,” he would add.
Perhaps the eighth-year head coach was more matter of fact in the postmortem here on Wednesday given that he knew this was far from their finest hour over the span of all 32 minutes. Even still, digging themselves out of an early hole when things appeared to be going sideways should also be a feather in the Eagles’ cap nonetheless.
“We just settled in,” said Sigman of his team’s about-face after their sluggish first few minutes. “It was like sleepwalking there for the first few minutes of the first quarter before we finally settled in. It was one of those, ‘Okay. We still have to play hard, guys. We can’t just show up and expect things to go right. You have to put in the effort,’” he elaborated on the message shared to his squad after their somewhat timid start.
“It was funny because (Susquehannock) called timeout after it was 4-0 even though I was going to,” he added. “I was like, ‘This is perfect because I have a lot I want to say right now,’” Sigman said coyly of the early stoppage to regather his squad. “We discussed some of the same things we had just discussed in the scouting report prior to going out there and we reiterated those things about energy and playing hard…Our energy was bad. We weren’t playing hard. We weren’t executing. We were turning the ball over, and we gave up like three offensive rebounds in the first two possessions,” the Eagles’ head man in listing the things that obviously were aggravating in the immediate aftermath of the ball first being tipped off. “We said, ‘We can’t play like that. We will not win if we play like this.’”
But make no mistake about it. Sigman surely felt the way he did because he knows what this team is capable of and what they can be when they put it all together, not just this season, but over the next couple of years behind a solid core nucleus which is now getting lathered up in terms of competing inside the varsity ranks. All told, it’s turned into a group now suddenly staring down the barrel of potentially winning half a dozen games in a row.
“I think we have the ability to play in a variety of different ways. Like, we can score 65 and we can score 49 like we did tonight and win,” the All-Star during his former playing days while wearing the Cocalico uniform said proudly of the program he now oversees. “I know every coach says this, but our guys really do just want to win. They are all so unselfish. Bryce (Nash) can score 10, he can score 2, but he’ll always be willing to guard the other team’s best player. It’s just the little stuff like that to where they don’t really care who scores and everybody wants to guard,” Sigman continued. “You know me. I’m a defensive-first guy to where I just want to make it absolutely miserable for the other team and we got guys that can do that…We knew it was going to take some time. It’s just the nature of what it is for us being a football school, but (his players) are playing hard. That’s the other thing too. If you play hard and lose, you can kind of accept that and go on from there. But we’re playing hard and we’re winning right now so it’s fun.”
And what would make the final week of December even more fun for them? Surely winning a holiday and/or tip-off tournament provided they can get the best of Garden Spot in the Spartans’ house on Thursday. Simply put, it’s been a minute since Cocalico has been able to achieve such a feat. In fact, it’s believed the Eagles have not done so since that 2020-21 COVID season that was mentioned earlier.
“I don’t know,” Sigman said after breaking a long pause when asked if Thursday makes for any sort of added incentive in that regard. “It’s another game. It’s another game. For where we’re at now, it’s another game that counts for districts for us. We’re right on that window after spotting those first three games. So yes, it probably does mean more to us than some teams that don’t have as long of a drought, but for us every game is important because we’re trying to dig ourselves out a hole that we’ve been in since the start. It matters, but it would be another win that goes in the win column at the end of the day.”
If nothing else, if Wednesday night against Susquehannock was to serve as any sort of microcosm for the Eagles’ season at large, provided they can replicate a drastic turnaround in the same vein as they were able to do against the Warriors in this one, Cocalico will be just fine once the dust finally settles. And who knows. Maybe this will eventually blossom into the year in which Cocalico becomes the kryptonite to L-S’ divisional prowess yet again.
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