NORTHAMPTON TOURNAMENT

Coaches are, by nature, complainers. They bark about this, bark about that. They want perfection from their kids and the officials.

So, it is refreshing to hear so many coaches say good things.

Pocono Mountain West's Brad Pensyl was happy about his team, happy to back in Northampton for the holidays. Pensyl enjoys coming down to the Lehigh Valley as much as possible and has found a home with the Konkrete Kids tournament. He even acknowledged the recent passing of longtime K-Kids fan Harriet Lindenmoyer and said it was a shame that she's no longer with us and will be missed.

The West-Northampton relationship also extends to PM West's assistant AD, Greg Vogel, a Northampton sports legend.

Pocono West is a very young team, a very talented team that will get better if they stay intact.

The Pocono West-Northampton game will be a good championship game tonight, a nice building block for the winner.

The Konkrete Kids, by the way, didn't play exceptionally well against Catasauqua, but coach Ed Ohlson is extremely pleased with the mix and leadership he has on that team. Northampton will be in the hunt in the LVC North and will be a District 11 playoff team.



(Catty's Josh Case, left, scored 21 points on Tuesday night, but Northampton's defense, including Landon Small (30), put the clamps on the Rough Riders).

Ohlson, by the way, agrees with me and others that the league may not have that one super team -- Liberty being the exception. But he agrees that teams 2 through 11 are very evenly matched and this regular season will offer close games and surprises every night. It should be a lot of fun to watch.

I will be surprised if there are not a lot of teams hovering around .500 and looking for district playoff berths in the final week of the regular season. It's conceivable that eight or nine teams from the LVC will make the D11 playoffs, but there's going to be little margin for error.

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Elsewhere on Tuesday night, Becahi won a close consolation game at Emmaus, while the host Green Hornets lost a thrrilling final to Upper Dublin.

Liberty lost its first game of the season in the Williamsport tournament against defending state champ Archbishop Carroll.

Whitehall won its tournament, in overtime.

Central Catholic got a much needed win over York Catholic.

Easton bounced back from a disappointing effort against Notre Dame with a low-scoring win over Wilson.

Allen lost to Frankford in its tournament title game.

Parkland continues to struggle and lost by a point in Wildwood, although the Trojans did finally get point guard Nick Miller back.

Notre Dame and Northern Lehigh picked up tourney titles.

Southern Lehigh seems to be playing better basketball after a slow start.

Palisades continues to lose the close ones, although Josh Parris had 30 points against Fleetwood.

Keith Groller