The 44^th annual Carlisle Classic, which featured a reunion of the Carlisle State Champions that went 33-0 in 1988, kicked off the basketball season for four different high school teams.

Carlisle, Mechanicsburg, Southwestern, and Hatboro-Horsham all competed in the tournament to kick off their seasons.  The first set of games held on Friday, Dec 6, featured match-ups between Mechanicsburg/Hatboro-Horsham and Carlisle/Southwestern.

Mechanicsburg dominated for most of the night, with seniors Drew Schankweiler and Zach Brunner leading the way with 18 and 13 points, respectively.  Mechanicsburg moved on to the finals winning 63-42 over Hatboro-Horsham.

After a warm reunion in front of almost a full gym featuring the 1988 State Champion team, Carlisle looked to make a statement to their fans and students against Southwestern.  Carlisle held a steady lead up until the last few minutes of the game, when some drama from an outside interruption led to a technical foul on Carlisle and two free throws for Southwestern. This allowed Southwestern to come within two points of the lead with less then a minute to go.  Although most of the momentum went to Southwestern after that sequence, Carlisle held on to win thanks to 31 points from senior Jordan Dockens.

With Mechanicsburg and Carlisle both winning their games, this set up the final game which was held on Sat, Dec 7.

On Saturday, Carlisle and Mechanicsburg played a close game the entire way. Senior Tim Atkinson was lights out in the first half, going 5 for 6 from the 3-point line, and totaling 20 points on the stat sheet at halftime. Mechanicsburg’s Schankweiler and Brunner both led the way for the team again, playing aggressive inside and scoring many baskets from just around the hoop.

Carlisle’s early foul trouble for some starters led to some players having to fill in for different roles in the game. This allowed Mechanicsburg to constantly feed the ball down low and score easy buckets.  Mechanicsburg ended up winning the game 64-58, with Schankweiler and Brunner totaling 20 and 19 points, respectively. Atkinson finished the game with 28 points for Carlisle.

Junior David Erfle commented on the tournament saying, “It has been a while since Carlisle has won its own tournament. Our mindset was definitely to come in and win our own tournament and break the losing streak.”

Erfle said the team “played with heart and we were aggressive the whole game. The only problem we ran into was our communication. If our communication on both ends of the floor can improve, we will be a hard team to beat.”

Junior Colby Saussaman, who attended both games of the classic, said the team “needs to improve on free throws. They get many chances at the line for easy points but haven’t converted them. Also, they need to keep the energy up for the entire game to finish teams out.”

When it comes to the fans, Colby believes “the fans can create an atmosphere for the team that can’t be recreated without them.”

Jordan Stasyszyn, assistant coach of both the Varsity and JV programs, was very satisfied with the team and how they performed for both games.  Regarding the Varsity team, Stasyszyn said, “They played well. There was a lot of excitement with the undefeated team coming back but our guys played together and played hard.”

Stasyszyn added,”The only thing we need to improve on is our defense, and if we can improve on that we can compete with anyone. Putting together two solid halves of basketball is important and that is our goal every game.”

The all-tournament team consisted of mostly Mechanicsburg and Carlisle players.  The players that were named were as follows: Mechanicsburg’s Brunner and Schankweiler, Carlisle’s Atkinson and Dockens, and Hatboro-Horsham’s Zach Quattro.  Drew Schankweiler was named MVP of the tournament.