Greyhounds eye PIAA playoff run
Prolific on offense and overwhelming on defense, Monessen rolled through much of its schedule with hefty expectations.
As dominating as the Greyhounds could be, they also were stagnant at times and tentative at others, which led to their quest for repeating as WPIAL Class A champions coming to an abrupt halt last Tuesday.
North Catholic used a buzzer-beating floater from the left baseline with 5.6 seconds remaining in overtime of their semifinal game to sink Monessen’s dream of a repeat, but head coach Joe Salvino has found a silver lining.
When Monessen (21-4), which earned the WPIAL’s third seed in the PIAA tournament, plays Farrell (19-6), the District 10 runner up, Friday at Slippery Rock’s Morrow Fieldhouse (7 p.m.), the Greyhounds will no longer carry the overburden of being an overwhelming favorite.
They’ll be an underdog against another Class A team for the first tiem since the PIAA quarterfinals last season, when they lost to Kennedy Catholic.
“A lot of the pressure is off of us now because we’re not the No. 1 seed any more,” Salvino said. “I could be wrong, but to me, it looked like we played the North Catholic game not to lose. I really think that maybe the pressure got to us.”
Pressure is inevitable when a team averages more than 90 points per game, scored 207 total points in its first two playoff games and has four players average at least 17 ppg. All four of those players were returning starters from last season, when the Greyhounds won their first WPIAL title since 2011.
After the Greyhounds rolled through their section schedule, Salvino grew concerned that a lack of competition would be a detriment to another title run. That was also the case in the postseason, when Monessen scored 95 and 112 points against Leechburg and Union, respectively.
Salvino believes a sense of complacency played a factor in the loss. Monessen, which has excelled with a pressing man-to-man defense and a fearless approach on offense, played lax on defense for one half against the Trojans and relied too heavily on outside shooting against a zone.
“What we learned the most is we’re beatable,” junior point guard Justice Rice said. “Teams out there know Monessen, they know we’re a good team and they are going to do whatever they can to beat us. If we don’t have our best game, we can be in trouble.”
Salvino knows better than to allow doubt to creep in after a loss. When the Greyhounds won back-to-back PIAA championships in 1988 and 1989, they did not win the WPIAL title in either season.
It could take just one state playoff win to give a team enough confidence to make a run at Hershey. That’s what happened in 1988, when Monessen lost a close semifinal game to Frew Mill in the WPIAL playoffs, but used a PIAA first-round win over George Junior Republic, the state’s top-ranked team at the time, in the first round to start a run at the program’s first state championship.
The Greyhounds will face a similar test Friday with Farrell. Led by senior guard Malik Miller (19.9 ppg), the Steelers have three losses to District 10 champion Kennedy Catholic by an average of just over five points. The Steelers also have losses against Aliquippa and New Castle.
“The WPIAL playoffs are a very prestigious thing,” Salvino said. “I try to compare winning the WPIAL to winning the ACC Tournament. Winning the state playoffs is like winning the NCAA. I always tell my players, ‘How far do you really want to move on and how much effort are you willing to put in?'”
That effort will need to include a return to the up-tempo style of Monessen basketball that makes opponents uncomfortable and leads to points in transition. Going away from that style might have cost the Greyhounds a WPIAL title, but they’re trying to ensure it won’t happen again.
“We wanted the WPIAL championship so bad, but it was almost like they took it from us,” Rice said. “It made us so much hungrier for this state championship opportunity, but we have to take it one game at a time.”