The Hawks traveled to North Hills High School, to take on top seeded North Allegheny in a quarterfinal matchup of the WPIAL Quad-A playoffs. Bethel Park suffered a tough loss to North Allegheny, 65-63.

North Allegheny was coming off a first round win where they thrashed Penn Trafford, 76-42, as Bethel Park was coming off a big win against McKeesport where they won, 80-73.

The Hawks knew they had to play one of their best games of the year to pull off the upset against the top ranked team in the WPIAL.

The game started out good for Bethel getting out to a 10-6 lead. But things quickly turned for NA as they went on a 13-0 run to end the first.

Things were even in the second quarter. Both teams each scored 20 points where there was much more scoring in this quarter than the first. Junior guard Josh Duda banked in a long three at the buzzer to end the first half.

North Allegheny lead 39-30 at half. The Hawks were struggling with outside shooting but showed success driving to to the basket.

North Allegheny’s leading scorer, senior Cole Constantino, was leading the way again for the Tigers through the first half. He posted 16 points for the Tigers in the first two quarters.

The Hawks were struggling to knock down their shots, but were having success driving to the basket. Senior guard Joey Mascaro was leading the way with nine, along with junior Levi Metheny adding some big baskets.

Bethel Park battled back in the third quarter to narrow the deficit to 51-47. Junior Chance Wright hit a buzzer beater to end the third, the Hawks’ second of the game.

Bethel Park seemed to never go away. Despite North Allegheny winning most of the game, the Hawks were still in good position to win the game.

Mascaro was really starting to heat up during the fourth. He was hitting big shot after big shot for the Hawks. None bigger than the one to tie the game with 55 seconds left to play. With a defender in his face, the senior pulled up in the corner and knocked it down with seemingly no difficulty. This was a big momentum grabber for the Hawks.

North Allegheny got the ball past half court and called timeout. As play resumed, they worked the ball around holding for the last shot. They got the ball into the hands of Constantino with time ticking down. He drove to his right, faded away, and knocked the shot down with 1.7 seconds remaining.

Bethel Park called a timeout right away to set something up. They tried throwing a deep pass, but the ball was knocked out of bounds on the sideline with 1.1 seconds remaining. This put the Hawks in a better position to get a shot off, since the ball was knocked out on the side of the court in which the Hawks were shooting.

Bethel called another timeout. The Hawks hit Mascaro in the corner for the three, but was blocked by a North Allegheny player.

Mascaro finished with 23 points and Metheny with 13. Constantino finshed with 26 for North Allegheny.

Despite the loss, Bethel Park still put forth a great effort against a tough team.

They unfortunately lost, 70-56, against Hempfield the following night in their play-in game to get into the state playoffs.

The season is over, but the Hawks put together an exciting season!