There are always \u201cfeel-good\u201d stories every year in my world of Lehigh Valley basketball.<\/p>\n
Just look a little deeper into the success of the Southern Lehigh girls\u2019 basketball team.\u00a0 They play with basically an iron five and four of them are underclassmen.\u00a0 Only Sydney Cyr, who is outstanding, by the way, is a senior.\u00a0 They won the Colonial League, but Colonial League teams are not expected to win Districts against teams from the bigger conferences.\u00a0 Even though they appeared in their 31st<\/sup> District tournament, they were 16-30 in those appearances and 0-2 in the championship games.\u00a0 That changed this year when they beat a very good Bethlehem Catholic team and won their first District XI title ever!\u00a0 As I write this, they have won 27 straight games and are into the second round of the PIAA state playoffs.\u00a0 Obviously, Coach Matt Cooper has done an outstanding job with this young team.\u00a0 This is a great story which, perhaps, can only get better.<\/p>\n The Easton girls\u2019 basketball team last won a title of any kind in 1970 \u2013 46 years ago.\u00a0 Head Coach Dave Lutz is a physical education teacher and he has had to stare at the banner every single day as it hangs in the gymnasium.\u00a0 Even approaching the championship game this year, history showed that they had lost five and won none.\u00a0 When his team won the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference championship, the first thing he told me was how he could not wait to see the new banner hanging in his office which is the gymnasium.\u00a0 He knew he would have a good team, but he did not expect to go through almost the entire season without the full roster of players available to him.\u00a0 This team suffered through injuries, heart arrhythmia, and mononucleosis.\u00a0 Even now, as they prepare to play the second round of the state playoffs, their starting center, leading rebounder, and tallest player is not available.\u00a0 Yet, they have continued to win.\u00a0 They are the only District XI AAAA girls\u2019 basketball team still playing.\u00a0 Another chapter awaits them this week.<\/p>\n And then there is the Bangor boys\u2019 basketball team.\u00a0 They won the Colonial League, but that is \u201cho-hum\u201d for them, having won three of the last four.\u00a0 What is not \u201cho-hum\u201d is winning in the District playoffs.\u00a0 The last time they were in a District championship was in 1988 \u2013 28 years ago.\u00a0 The best player on that team was Bron Holland, who just happens to be the head coach of this year\u2019s squad.\u00a0 Bangor was not going to beat Parkland for the District championship.\u00a0 They are ranked third in the state and no team has beaten Parkland since they got all their championship football players back.\u00a0 Parkland has won 24 games in a row.\u00a0 Take that game off Bangor\u2019s schedule and they have won16 straight \u2013 26 overall, a school record for wins.\u00a0 This team has electrified and solidified a town.\u00a0 Rumor has it that the town of Bangor is empty when the Slaters play on the road.\u00a0 Some imply even the police attend (probably just the off-duty ones).\u00a0 Now they are in the second round of the PIAA playoffs, unheard of for a AAAA Colonial League team.<\/p>\n As I watch the basketball season wind down, these are a few of the stories I will not forget.\u00a0 They make me and, hopefully, our viewers \u201cfeel good\u2019!<\/p>\n ABOVE THE EARS (SOME MUSINGS)<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There are always \u201cfeel-good\u201d stories every year in my world of Lehigh Valley basketball. Just look a little deeper into the success of the Southern Lehigh girls\u2019 basketball team.\u00a0 They play with basically an iron five and four of them are underclassmen.\u00a0 Only Sydney Cyr, who is outstanding, by the way, is a senior.\u00a0 They…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"Yoast SEO Relevanssi index exclude","inline_featured_image":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,4],"tags":[626,625,627,628],"class_list":["post-78007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-behind-the-mic","category-featured","category-sports","tag-bangor-boys-basketball","tag-easton-girls-basketball","tag-parkland-boys-basketball","tag-southern-lehigh-girls-basketball"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n
\n
\n
\n
\n