Friday night, Penn Wood put the finishing touches on its first District One Class AAAA championship in 18 years ... and the Daily Times was all over it. (Game story and column can be found here.)

The Times was on the baseline, too, with staff photographer Bob Gurecki nabbing some shots of the action:
Penn Wood reserve forward Jeff Kyem pulls down a rebound in front of Plymouth-Whitemarsh's C.J. Aiken in the first half.

Shawn Oakman (center) embraces Aaron Brown (left) and Will Brown (right) in the moments following the Patriots' upset of the Colonials.

Reserve guard Jerry Price (No. 1) rushes to the court after the buzzer to meet Will Brown and Aaron Brown (back) following the Patriots' first district championship victory since 1992.

AROUND THE STATE
In a major upset, Reading dispatched Hempfield, 54-46, Saturday in the District Three Class AAAA title game. Hempfield, the top seed, had gone 27-0 en route to the title game.

What that does is make Penn Wood's road to a repeat as state champion a little more bumpy, with Reading winning and going to the West side of the PIAA bracket. The weekend is long, so let's see how the rest of the bracket shakes out before we reach any conclusions.

AROUND THE COUNTY
In the District One Class AAAA seventh-place game. Penncrest toppled Chester, 56-53, at West Chester East High School. The Lions' Rodney Duncan went off for 31 points, a career high. The Clippers trailed by 10 with two minutes to go before closing the gap. According to Penncrest coach Mike Doyle, Duncan's point tally is the best for any Lion in more than eight years.

In case you didn't pick up the Sunday Times, the Daily Times sports staff was ALL over the District One Class AAAA, AAA and A playoffs. We had a writer at all six boys basketball postseason games.

We also had staff photographer at a few of them. Here's Bob Gurecki's view from the baseline:


Marple Newtown's Soutiri Sapnas drives past a Harriton defender Wednesday during the Tigers' District One Class AAA first-round victory.


Penncrest's Rodney Duncan eludes Plymouth-Whitemarsh's C.J. Aiken Saturday in the Lions' loss to the Colonials in a District One Class AAAA quarterfinal.


Chester's Rondae Jefferson tries to bring in an offensive rebound in the Clippers' District One Class AAAA quarterfinal loss to Souderton.

Here's a closer look at Penn Wood's 57-40 win over Chester Thursday:

***LAUGH IT OFF. Clippers forward Ronnell Williams experienced the joy and ire of coach Larry Yarbray in one trip to the free throw line. When the sophomore banked in a foul shot, Yarbray laughed and smiled at his young big man. And when Williams clanked the next one, Yarbray screamed at him to get down the floor and defend.

***COLLEGE ROLL CALL. Three members of the nationally-ranked Temple Owls' rotation were at the Clip Joint. Chester All-Delco Rahlir Jefferson sat beside former Clippers coach Fred Pickett, while Scootie Randall and Ramone Moore (Jefferson's teammates with the No. 19 Owls) were seated in the row in front of him.

***1,000 POINT CLUB, PART I. Before the game, Chester honored Maurice Nelson, who scored his career 1,000th point Tuesday in a road game at Interboro. But Tyree Johnson got the best of Nelson. Johnson, who scored his 1,000th point in an earlier meeting with Chester, had the better game this time around, too. ...And he did so less than 24 hours after making his college commitment.

***SUPER 7 DISCUSSION. Speaking of Pickett, the longtime Clippers coach asked me why Chester had slipped to No. 4 in the latest Daily Times' Super 7. After giving my explanation, Pickett walked away. He wanted nothing of it. But he's a good sport. He came back a minute later, smiling. (Like any good coach, he knows not to take sports too seriously. That's the key.)

***1,000 POINT CLUB, PART II. One of Darby Township's finest was a referee Thursday. Derick Loury, who scored 1,137 points in his career with the Eagles, worked the game at the Clip Joint.

(Note: PHOTOS BY DAILY TIMES STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER BOB GURECKI. Check delcotimes.com Friday for video from the game.)

Sunday, Penn Wood point guard Tyree Johnson became the eighth player in school history to score 1,000 points in his career. He did so nonchalantly, too, hitting a fourth-quarter free throw late in Penn Wood's 66-48 rout of Chester.

Johnson, the reigning Daily Times Player of the Year, finished with 10 points in the game. He joins Lamont Ferrell*, Rap Curry, Mike Holmes, Shawn Day, Ed Millard, Duane Johnson and Micah Covert# in Penn Wood's 1,000-point club. (Ferrell started at Yeadon and finished his career at Penn Wood; Covert started with the Pats and capped his career off with Chester).

Johnson's per-game average is down from a year ago. It doesn't have either him or Penn Wood coach Clyde Jones worried.

"Listen, it doesn’t really matter. I’m a point guard," Johnson said. "My job is to get everybody involved anyway. My points are going to come during the flow. I get them the ball, they get it to me. It’s as simple as that."

Added Jones: "The greatest compliment I can give Tyree this year is how, for the most part, he has really decided that he has other people to get the ball to. He sees himself as a distributor. And in this day and age, when it’s tough to get kids to not think I have to shoot, to see him do that is special. The sad part about that is it doesn’t put him in anybody’s rankings for scoring, but it makes him perfect for us and what we do. The other night, I actually had to tell him to shoot the ball."

Johnson is getting interest from Monmouth, Rider, Hartford and Siena.

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Also, here's some more from the boys basketball scene:
---Daily Times photographer Bob Gurecki grabbed some video and assembled highlights from Sunday's Penn Wood-Chester game.
---This week marks the first installment of the boys basketball notebook - the feature focuses on The Haverford School's Andrew Acker, probably the county's most improved player thus far. The notes include Glen Mills' Raheem Harvey, who sustained a car accident during the holidays and remains hospitalized, and Chichester's Brian Parker, who has an outside chance at 1,000 points.

Here's an up-close look at the Chester/Penn Wood game:
Early in the second quarter and with the game's outcome still in doubt, Penn Wood junior forward Aaron Brown (pictured) was whistled for a technical foul. The call was questionable, causing spectators and reporters, alike, to scratch their heads.

Brown is not an overly aggressive player. And players from both sides were jawing. Turns out he was whistled for running into his teammate, Shawn Oakman, which had to have been perceived as a sign of boasting, because there was no blatant contact between players from opposing teams.

"They all talk (trash) and any kind of bump would be seen as a form of aggression," Penn Wood coach Clyde Jones said. "Aaron is always emotional. But I know his emotions are going to lead to production."

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BY THE NUMBERS
10-11: Chester's proficiency at the free-throw line, a 91-percent clip.
19-34: Penn Wood's proficiency at the free-throw line, a 55-percent clip.
37-21: Penn Wood's rebounding advantage.
1: Technical foul, against Penn Wood's Aaron Brown.
3:28: Time it took Chester to get on the board.
4: Points scored by Will Brown during a dynamic second-quarter play. He hit a 3-pointer from the right side of the arc and, after sustaining a foul by Chester's Laquan Robinson, made the subsequent free throw.

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The arrangement to bring the first meeting of the season between these two Pennsylvania titans to Saint Joseph's University was the product of internal connections. Penn Wood alumnus Rap Curry, also the Patriots' athletic director, played a fruitful college career on Hawk Hill. So did Jameer Nelson, whose younger brother, Maurice Nelson, plays for Chester.

The younger Nelson, who had 17 points, was playing on the floor of Hagan Arena - formerly the Fieldhouse - for the first time in his life. And hanging about the court, in the rafters, is a banner bearing his brother's No. 14 and his likeness.

"I didn't even look up there today," Mo Nelson said. "I have in the past. Not today."

PHOTO BY DAILY TIMES' PHOTOGRAPHER BOB GURECKI