Third time's a charm: Highlands defeats Hampton in WPIAL 4A quarterfinals
WEXFORD, Pennsylvania – Highlands was hoping the old saying "third time's a charm" would come true in their WPIAL quarterfinal game against Hampton on Thursday night, and it did.
After losing the first two meetings of the season to Hampton, it was finally Highlands’ turn for a win, as they defeated the Talbots 58-41.
Cameron Reigard led Highlands with a team-high 14 points while teammates Jimmy Kunst and Bradyn Foster both contributed 13 each.
The big difference for Hampton was that its leading scorer, Peter Kramer, did not play in the game because of the PIAA transfer rules, which indicates that a sophomore, junior or senior cannot play in the postseason the year after transferring schools.
Kramer, a transfer from Shady Side Academy, ended the regular season averaging 20.1 points per game in the 19 games that he played. In the first round of the WPIAL 4A playoffs, Hampton defeated Blackhawk 65-50 without Kramer, but this time that luck did not extend.
“It’s great that we won, especially (since they) beat us the first two times this season,” Foster said. “They’re obviously a great team without Peter (Kramer) and it was great we didn’t have them play as well as they wanted to.”
Even without Kramer, Highlands knew Hampton had other players on the team that could make an impact, and the Golden Rams had to make sure to stay focused.
“The mentality stayed the same, we definitely wanted to lock in defensively,” Kunst said. ‘Hampton was 20-2 and they were still a (number) four seed and they definitely had a lot of key pieces around them, so we still had the same mentality and it worked this time.”
The game was tied 15-15 at the end of the first quarter and the Golden Rams led 25-19 at halftime, but once the third quarter started, Highlands started to run away with the game and outscored 33-22 in the second half.
as it was clearly shown that Hampton isn’t as dominant on offense without Kramer, as the 41 points scored by the Talbots were the least number of points that they had scored all season.
Hampton’s Eric Weeks scored a team-high 16 points, but after he scored 10 in the first quarter, Highlands held him to just six points the rest of the way.
“I think we definitely worked as a team,” Kunst said, who also scored 13 points in the game. “We worked the ball around and I think the scoring was distributed perfectly and we trusted each other on both ends and that was a big key.
The win moves Highlands into a WPIAL semifinal matchup with Lincoln Park on Monday night, with the winner advancing to the WPIAL 4A championship on Friday, March 3rd.
“I watched my teammates win a WPIAL championship (in 202) when I was in eighth grade,” Foster said. “So that’s definitely something I want to be a part of.”
