Surprise, surprise. Northgate will play for a WPIAL championship Saturday for the first time in 35 years. And while the red-hot Flames have been one of the Cinderella stories of the postseason, their seemingly overnight arrival as a WPIAL finalist has come as no surprise to coach Cam Williams.
“I know a lot of people are just thinking we came out of nowhere, but that’s not what happened,” said Williams, whose team upset No. 2-seeded and two-time defending WPIAL champion Bishop Canevin in the semifinals. “We knew when these guys were freshmen that we would be all right. They played six days a week from the summer through the fall, and we always played bigger schools. We were the smallest school in there.”
When it takes the floor in the Class 2A championship at 1 p.m. Saturday at Pitt’s Petersen Events Center, sixth-seeded Northgate (19-6) won’t face a big school, but it will square off against a program with big tradition and success. Top-seeded Aliquippa (19-6) has won 12 WPIAL titles, tied for third most in league history. The Quips had lost in the semifinals five years in a row but return to the final for the first time since finishing 30-0 in 2016. They lost in the 2022 PIAA Class 3A championship.
“It feels really good,” said Aliquippa coach Nick Lackovich, who guided the Quips to that perfect season. “Since we came up a little short last year, to be able to get that turned around has been great.”
Williams has done a remarkable job in turning around the Northgate program in his three seasons. The Flames went 6-16 the season before he arrived and had not finished with a winning record since 2014. Williams, a 1995 graduate of old Wilkinsburg High School, lost his first eight games in a first season that saw Northgate go 4-19. But that record improved to 11-11 last season, and Northgate’s 17 wins this season are its most since winning 21 in 2007 when the Flames lost to Herb Pope and Aliquippa in the WPIAL Class 2A semifinals. That had been the most recent time the Flames advanced to the semifinals prior to this season.
“They really have the pieces, “Lackovich said. “First off, their coach has done a good job and they’ve continued to get better. We’ve played them twice, but I wouldn’t read a whole lot into that because they have gotten a lot better since then.”
Another Williams also has played a large part in Northgate’s turnaround. Josh Williams (no relation to the coach) is a junior guard who averaged a team-high 19.5 points in the regular season and has been on an absolute tear in the postseason as he has pumped in 31, 28 and 36 points in the team’s three playoff triumphs. He pairs with senior guard Stephen Goetz (19 points per game) to give the Flames one of the top scoring duos in the WPIAL.
“I have the best kept secret in the WPIAL in No. 5,” Cam Williams said of Josh Williams.
Northgate averages 69 points per game (second highest in Class 2A), but it now braces for the challenge of trying to fill up the basket against one of the WPIAL’s stingiest defenses. The Quips and their highly effective man-to-man defense give up 42.7 points a game, fourth fewest in the WPIAL. It’s the fewest points the Quips have given up in a season since their 30-0 team of 2016. They have surrendered only 35.3 points a game in the postseason.
“We’re really locked in right now,” Lackovich said. “They’re really embracing it and doing a great job with it.”
Aliquippa has been very balanced offensively. No player even averages 15 points a game. Among its top players are senior guard D.J. Walker, junior forward Cam Lindsey and sophomore guard Quentin Goode. All three were also big contributors on Aliquippa’s WPIAL championship football team. Goode scored 24 points in the semifinal win against Greensburg Central Catholic.
Northgate unquestionably will be the underdog Saturday, but that was also the case against Bishop Canevin, and the Flames were more than up for the challenge. Another upset would make for an impressive additional chapter to this Cinderella story.
“It would be great,” Cam Williams said. “The first WPIAL championship in Northgate history. It would be fantastic for the players and the community.”
Class 6A championship
While the Class 2A final features an unfamiliar face, the Class 6A tilt features a team that very well could have made travel plans to Petersen Events Center prior to this season.
New Castle (22-2), the No. 1 seed, wasn’t a prohibitive favorite to win a title or even advance to the final, but history suggested that the Red Hurricanes would get to this point. Coach Ralph Blundo now has guided his team to a championship appearance nine times in his 13 seasons. The Red Hurricanes have won seven titles in that time and have claimed a record 14 overall. They will try to win No. 15 at 7 p.m. Saturday when they face Central Catholic (15-9).
“In 13 years, we’ve had a good level of success, and we’re proud of that,” Blundo said, “but make no mistake about it, it’s truly about the players. You cannot be good at this game with bad basketball players. You just can’t. And we’ve been fortunate to have good basketball players that have given us the opportunity to become a champion. Because without them it just can’t happen.”
This is New Castle’s first appearance in the Class 6A final. It was bumped up from Class 5A this season due to the PIAA’s competitive balance rule. The Red Hurricanes were the runners-up in the WPIAL and PIAA Class 5A tournaments a year ago. The WPIAL loss especially was painful considering it ended with controversy. Laurel Highlands star Rodney Gallagher was fouled with 0.3 seconds left in double overtime and proceeded to knock down two free throws to give the Mustangs a thrilling 60-58 win.
Blundo said the pain of that loss is still with him.
“I wish it would go away, but it hasn’t,” said Blundo, who is 312-49 at New Castle and has 68 postseason wins. “That one was tough, just kind of the way it ended. And that was the first time that we had lost there.
“They want to have another opportunity at The Pete. There’s nothing like New Castle creating a ghost town for a few hours on a Saturday night.”
No team has a shorter trip to The Pete than third-seeded Central Catholic, which will have to travel about 1 mile to get there. There’s a local bus charter company named Urso Bus, appropriate because fourth-year coach Brian Urso has driven the Vikings to their first WPIAL final since 2012. Following a 65-41 semifinal win against No. 2 Upper St. Clair, the Vikings now will try to win their first title since 2008.
“Everyone is super excited,” Urso said. “The boys [after the semifinal win] were just over the moon. They’re proud of each other and excited to finally get there after four years. The bus ride back was electric.”
Central Catholic is one of only two teams to beat New Castle this season. (Mars is the other.) The Section 1 rivals played twice in the regular season, with Central Catholic winning at New Castle, 56-45, Jan. 10 and New Castle claiming a 67-53 win Feb. 3 at Central Catholic. Of note, New Castle’s leading scorer, Isaiah Boice, did not play in either of New Castle’s losses due to a foot injury.
Dante DePante is a senior guard for Central Catholic and one of the WPIAL’s top players. DePante averaged 15.9 points a game in the regular season and has taken his game to another level in the playoffs, scoring 34 points in the quarterfinals and 25 in the semifinals. But a big storyline in this game is height. Central Catholic features 6-7 senior Debaba Tshiebwe and 6-5 junior Cole Sullivan, while there’s nobody in New Castle’s main rotation taller than 6-2.
“We obviously had two very good basketball games against them and respect their program,” Blundo said. “And, yeah, they’ve got some big bodies. As big as you’re going to find around here in 6A. They’re really good and I think they’re playing their best basketball right now.”
The same can be said about New Castle, which has ripped off 11 wins in a row. As they almost always are, the Red Hurricanes face a size disadvantage against most opponents, but Blundo’s squad makes up for it via their pressure defense, grit and playing for one another.
“It’s because of their heart,” Urso said. “Coach Blundo instills that will and hard work in them. Those kids run up a wall for him. He has guys who have bought into the program and they have the experience of being there the last three years.”
Boice and Jonathan Anderson are senior guards for New Castle and its top two scorers. Both average about 17 points a game. The other starters are sophomore guard Ralphie Blundo (son of coach), senior forward Da’Jaun Young and senior guard Nick Wallace. Young scored 22 points, Boice 18 and Anderson 18 in the second meeting with Central Catholic.
Count Boice among those who were rooting for a New Castle-Central Catholic final.
“It’s amazing,” he said. “I was looking forward to this one. It’s going to be a big game, especially at The Pete.”
Brad is a sports writer at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he's currently on strike. Email him at beverett@unionprogress.com.