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Warwick Takes Tough Initial Punch, Responds With Lethal Blitzkrieg As Warriors Cruise Past Donegal, Into District 3-5A Quarterfinal Round
 

Warwick Takes Tough Initial Punch, Responds With Lethal Blitzkrieg As Warriors Cruise Past Donegal, Into District 3-5A Quarterfinal Round

Written by: Andy Herr on February 20, 2023

 

When we make comments that usually are along the lines of “The future of Lancaster-Lebanon League boys’ basketball is incredibly bright,” yes, while we may indirectly be talking about the players inside of the conference most specifically, it’d be extremely foolish to overlook the work of the many young coaches that the league can also boast about at the very same time. Case in point, the current situations ongoing at both Donegal and Warwick respectively.

Granted, while it may seem at first glance that he has been there for a period akin to that of going on forever given how much success his programs have already pumped out during his tenure thus far, something best evidenced by having already topped his 100 wins accrued on the job, Warwick head coach Chris Christensen still is not anywhere close to approaching 40 years of age meaning that the future of the Warriors’ program will remain in good hands as long as he continues to have the keys to the machine which certainly appears for years and years to come. Sure enough, this year too has been no different. Well, in some ways technically speaking given that this was the first season in which Warwick failed to get at least a share of the L-L Section Two title, a circumstance that became reality following a sweep at the hands of newfound basketball rival Manheim Central, for the first time in nearly half a decade. However, like most other years, the Warriors yet again made another stop-off in the league playoffs last week before then entering the District 3 tournament this week, a tourney in which they reached the crown jewel of it all last season –the 6A finale – before falling to the defending state champions in Reading High in that title fight at the Giant Center.

Ironically, their opposition on this lid-lifting playoff night was an outfit led by another young buck who seems destined to make his imprint on the L-L League so long as time allows him.

Simply put, when the administration at Donegal rightfully awarded the boys’ basketball gig to one Ryan Shipper before the start of this season, it was most certainly a breath of fresh air for a program that it seemed for years and years just needed to do something a little bit different in order to try and find a spark and separate itself from the pack. Well, if Shipper’s first year on the job is to perhaps serve as a precursor of things yet to come, rest assured that the Donegal Indians will be not only a headache for the rest of the league to try and contend with, but perhaps a lethal one at that behind such a promising up-and-coming coach with basketball coaching being his family’s primary choice of occupation. In short, aside from being a team that made its opposition earn absolutely everything over the course of the entire campaign, the results themselves put forth were good enough for the Indians to secure a berth in the District 3-5A crop at the end of the regular season this year, a solid beginning to what appears to be an incredibly bright future still yet to unfold over in Mount Joy.

However, even for all their successes demonstrated up until this point, Monday night’s trip to Lititz to tangle with the playoff-grizzled Warriors figured to arguably be the stiffest of tests that Donegal would encounter throughout the entirety of the year. And while they would yet again make Warwick scratch and claw for every inch of footing that the Warriors could possibly muster throughout the early portion of the contest, an incredible Warrior-led blitzkrieg that spanned over two halves would prove to be the difference once the dust would finally settle once and for all on this night.

Early on though, it looked like it would be anything but a Warwick runaway.

Sure, while there was the pair of 3-balls sunk by way of Caleb Johnsen and Carter Horst that propelled the hosts out to a 6-4 lead nary two minutes into it, a trifecta dialed up by Donegal’s Evyan Patal made it a 9-8 Indians’ advantage roughly one minute later.

From there, even despite Warwick continuing to rain in the 3’s, such as the case when Johnsen proceeded to rifle in another trey at the 2:10 mark of the opening stanza which made it a 16-12 Warriors’ gap, the Indians showed that same exact resolve which has come to define their collective DNA this entire year as the same identical offensive set run by Shipper in back-to-back trips down the floor successfully resulted in Patal treys on each occasion, meaning that Donegal would claim ownership of the 18-16 cushion with just 40 seconds left to go. Sure enough, once the buzzer rang out to signify the end of the opening act, Donegal had surely made a strong early case for itself given the Indians’ 19-16 lead they held prior to the start of the second frame.

In the second quarter though? Well, that’s when Warwick made a mammoth charge that Donegal simply couldn’t match.

Even still, Donegal continued to remain fearsome and pesky throughout much of the second quarter seeing as how Warwick could not quite gain the lead and continued to live in their visitor’s shadow most of the time. However, while it seemed incredibly innocent at the time given the way in which things appeared to be incredibly dead-even up until that point, a Johnsen take to the cup which made it a 21-20 Warwick lead with 4:10 left would start a tsunami wave that came crashing down on those dressed in green for nearly eight minutes of game time there on out.

From there, following the Warwick sophomore’s two-point addition to what would be his game-high scoring performance in netting a total of 16 that paced an incredibly well-rounded Warriors’ effort on the evening as a whole, a five-point salvo that exclusively came via another Warwick underclassman, Tyree Hughes, made it a 26-21 Warwick cushion with one minute left to go in the opening half courtesy of the 5’8 junior’s quick charge. Then, with just enough time left to spare, the youngest of Warriors found in the rotation, Ya’Majesty Washington, got into the act too as the freshman’s trey mere moments before the clock struck zeroes would then usher Warwick into the half with the 29-21 lead to their name.

But not even a quick ten-minute stoppage could do much of anything if the ask was to slow down the Warwick onslaught.

In fact, the Warwick remained just as steadfast once the third quarter rolled around.

For proof of that, look no further than a pair of trifectas splashed in by Caleb Johnsen and Trevor Evans respectively, a six-point dagger-like incision squarely placed into Donegal’s collective hopes of trying to perhaps mount a second half charge as Warwick suddenly found themselves up by 14 at 35-21 just one minute into the new half.

The trouble was, Warwick only continued to keep lobbing haymakers over the fence.

As if the current two-touchdown deficit wasn’t nearly enough, the Warriors’ cushion would then swell up to 20 at 42-22 following a Carter Horst triple with 4:45 left to play in the third meaning that the Indians had been outscored by an incredible 23-2 clip going back to the aforementioned Johnsen take to the cup back in the second quarter which had made it a 21-20 Warwick lead at the time.

Finally, and certainly not a moment too soon as far as the Indians’ contingent had to be concerned, a field goal tallied for their side which came via junior forward James Turbedsky made it a 42-26 difference with just 1:40 left to play in the third.

Yet just as he had done at the end of the previous quarter, Ya’Majesty Washington would inflict yet another back-breaking bucket into the Donegal camp as a put-back bunny right at the buzzer allowed Warwick to saunter into the fourth with the commanding 44-24 advantage.

In the final act, while the eventual outcome was nothing but a formality by that point, the eight minutes still left on the clock was more than enough time for those on either side to get themselves into the score book.

Of course, Washington clearly felt that he too had ample time at his disposal to add to what figures to be the first of many District 3 playoff games over the course of his career while wearing the Warwick colors as his three-point play near the halfway mark of the fourth upped the Warriors’ lead to a 52-31 count with 4:30 left to go.

That said, on the Donegal side of the ledger, it would be a senior, Nate McKnight, who would then make the most of his opportunity after checking into the contest.

And in a similar fashion to the proficiency in which he displayed earlier in the season that came inside of the Indians’ road win at Northern Lebanon, the 6’1 forward’s ability to knock down the long ball proved to be on display once more as the McKnight trey made it a 58-36 ballgame with the game careening towards its inevitable conclusion.

However, that only meant that time was right for another of the Warriors’ collective young guns, Parker Horst, to get his opportunity to shine as the diminutive 5’7 sophomore displayed a fearlessness that doesn’t accurately describe his listed height as Horst’s determined take to the cup in the game’s waning moments seemed to be the most fitting of punctuation marks down the stretch as Warwick was ultimately able to seal the deal by virtue of their 62-38 triumph over a fellow L-L League foe found in Donegal, vaulting the Warriors into Thursday’s quarterfinal round of the 5A bracket.

 

NEXT UP: Speaking of Thursday, just like last year, it’ll be yet another Warwick trip over to the west shore. This time, while it won’t be 6A’s Cumberland Valley as the destination plugged into the GPS for this particular excursion, it’ll be another challenge equally as stern no doubt when the Warriors meet up with fourth-seeded Mechanicsburg, a 52-44 victor over Greencastle-Antrim in their own right on Monday evening.

On the other side, while Monday’s loss marked the end of the line for Donegal’s 2022-23 campaign, this season encapsulated from start to finish almost certainly has to be described as a success if you are an Indians’ backer. After all, for a program who’s trips to the postseason have essentially been few and far between over the last many years quite frankly, a rightfully earned playoff bid in this the initial campaign of a young coach will most certainly pour a hefty amount of concrete on which the Indians can build a stable and sturdy foundation for years and years to come. Not only that, but when you look at Monday night in a vacuum and discover that nearly 80% of the Indians’ scoring accumulated against Warwick will join the fold come the start of next season, it becomes easy to see as to why the rest of the league will have to look at Donegal and consider them a very real and dangerous threat to contend with in terms of the years directly ahead. At least that certainly what Ryan Shipper is hoping to have be the case.

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