La Salle bands together, rallies past Archbishop Carroll in PCL quarterfinals

SPRINGFIELD >> Zach Crisler was still shaking just thinking about it.

The La Salle senior, who walked out of the team’s locker room to a standing ovation, admitted he still couldn’t fully process his team’s last offensive possession Friday night. He remembered throwing a bad pass that got deflected, somehow recovering it and managing to score.

He remembered the free throw that came after too.

Even if the details were a bit hazy, the outcome wasn’t. No. 2 La Salle erased a 17-point fourth quarter deficit to slip past No. 7 Archbishop Carroll 49-47 in their Philadelphia Catholic League quarterfinal thriller, booking a trip to the Palestra.

“It’s kind of a blur thinking back on it,” Crisler said. “I remember going down the lane, I saw Konrad (Kiszka) open, I probably should have bounced it to him but I threw a chest pass. It got tipped, I went up, came down with the ball, saw a spot to get it up at the rim and finished.

“That was the hardest free throw of my life after that. The gym was so loud, I couldn’t hear myself think, it was just amazing.”

Carroll was simply put, the better team for 28 minutes. The Patriots, who had edged La Salle in the regular season on a buzzer-beater, had more energy, grabbed more rebounds, defended better and made more shots for three-plus quarters.

Tairi Ketner led the effort for Carroll, posting a team-best 19 points and just having his way on the low block, shooting 9-of-12 from the floor. La Salle had to take the 6-foot-4 forward out of the picture and did so in the fourth quarter with its aggressive pressure defense.

Patriots coach Francis Bowe felt the end of the game was reflective of another one a team with red as its main color played earlier this week. Carroll, which led 38-21 at the end of the third, just couldn’t stop the bleeding in the final quarter.

“I felt like I was watching the Louisville game and we were Louisville against Duke,” Bowe said. “It’s basketball, those things happen. It was like a spitting image of what happened last time we played them, put some pressure on, have some turnovers and miss a few key shots. It was a great basketball game.”

There wasn’t one player who was the hero for La Salle, although Crisler had the dramatic winning bucket with six seconds left. La Salle spent most of the fourth playing offense-defense, subbing in two or three guys on every stoppage in play.

It also helped that the miserable shooting, the Explorers were 7-of-26 from the floor through three quarters, finally ended. Senior guard Titus Beard, who chipped in six fourth quarter points while also flying around the floor on defense, said he felt a different energy.

“We weren’t trying to go home,” Beard said. “We had to pull together and find a way to get the win. As seniors, we didn’t want this to be our last Catholic League game so it was time to pull together and give it everything we had.”

La Salle only had one made 3-pointer until Crisler buried one off a feed from Kiszka with 5:13 left, cutting the lead to 40-29. In the final quarter, the Explorers hit 9-of-15 shots and 4-of-6 attempts from past the arc.

The biggest may have been Jake Timby’s corner make with 1:17 left, with the junior pulling despite a defender on him, making it a 46-43 game.

“On defense, we got up on them and made them uncomfortable, then we just went downhill on offense,” Timby, who connected on a pair of treys in the fourth, said. “We had to speed them up and get turnovers.

“We just wanted it so bad. We haven’t been here in so long, we just went out and shot it.”

La Salle out-scored Carroll 28-9 in the final quarter of play.

Carroll’s fall came down to turnovers and free throws. The Patriots gave the ball away six times in the final quarter, but it was their struggles at the line that eventually did them in.

Of the 16 free throws the Patriots attempted in the fourth, they missed nine of them, including their last four which opened the window for La Salle to come all the way back.

“We just lost our mental composure there, it’s something we can learn from,” Bowe said. “We still have districts and states and I think it’s going to make us better.

“I had a couple of my seniors right after the game ask if we could practice tomorrow and I said absolutely not. We need a little time to decompress and get hungry and these guys will be.”

Kiszka scored on a drive with 23 seconds left, cutting the lead down to one. After two missed free throws on the other end, La Salle got the ball back with 15.9 to go, then Crisler — who scored 11 of his 13 in the fourth — just found a way to make something happen.

“Believe, that’s our big thing, we’re on a mission and we just have to believe all the time, no matter what happens,” Crisler said. “We’re a family, we have to stick with each other through everything.

“We said to each other at the start of the fourth, ‘this is it, we’ve worked for this all season, so let’s give it all we’ve got.’”

Carroll’s season is not over, as the Patriots will play in the District 12 4A third-place game and move on to states.

La Salle faces No. 3 Bishop McDevitt — a 52-49 winner over No. 6 Archbishop Wood — at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Palestra. No. 1 Roman Catholic and No. 4 Neumann-Goretti will be the other semifinal at 8:15 p.m.

This is the first trip to the Palestra for any of the current La Salle players, and it’s not an opportunity they’re taking lightly.

“It’s just something you dream of,” Crisler said. “We did not have our best game at all, we pulled together and played strong. It was great to see our whole family come together like that.”

“I’m a little tired right now, but I can’t let it kick in because I’m too hyped up after this win,” Beard said. “It’s everything. One of our goals was to get there, now we have to win there.”

La Salle 49, Archbishop Carroll 47
La Salle 8 6 7 28 – 49
Archbishop Carroll 16 13 9 9 – 47
La Salle: Allen Powell 4 4-6 13, Titus Beard 3 2-2 8, Konrad Kiszka 3 3-6 9, Jake Timby 2 0-0 6, Zach Crisler 4 3-3 13. Nonscoring: Khalil Diarrah, Sam Brown, Manny Freyere, Jack Rothenberg. Totals: 16 12-17 49.
Archbishop Carroll: Tairi Ketner 9 1-4 19, Kiyl Mack 2 1-4 5, Ny’Mire Little 0 2-4 2, Luke House 4 2-2 13, Anquan Hill 3 1-1 7, Cole Burkitt 0 1-2 1. Nonscoring: Amiri Stewart. Totals: 18 8-17 47
3-pointers: L – Crisler 2, Timby 2, Powell; AC – House 3.