The Parkland High School boys basketball team has played one of the most competitive early-season schedules its had the last few years, with head coach Andy Stephens wanting to schedule difficult nonconference competition to help prepare his team when it comes to postseason time. The Trojans are talented and are one of the favorites this year for Eastern Pennsylvania Conference and District 11 championships.

The week in between Christmas and New Year’s offers many holiday tournaments. This year, Parkland competed in the Reading High School tournament, featuring the host Knights, Devon Prep and EPC foe Pocono Mountain West.

In their opening game last Tuesday night, the Trojans led at halftime, but were outscored 36-22 in the second half and fell to Devon Prep 59-46.

“They sped us up and made us play at an uncomfortable speed,” said Stephens about the second half. “They were talented and played really hard. It is good for us in the long run to play against teams like this. Their pressure got to us some and they made big shots in crunchtime when they needed scores. That’s how good teams win. It’s a recipe for success and they were on tonight.”

The score was tied 9-9 after the first quarter as the two teams started slow after having a few days off consecutively with Christmas. But in the second quarter, Parkland had its highest scoring output with five different players helping to tally 15 points and the Trojans went into halftime leading 24-23.

But the Tide got things going after intermission, using the third quarter to go on an 18-10 run to lead 41-34 after three and continued to extend their lead in the fourth.

“I thought we competed well,” said Stephens. “We may not have executed like I would have preferred, but we did compete. We will get better moving forward and learn from this one.”

Eight different Trojans scored in the game, led by eight points from Matt Rantz. Nick Coval and Will Meeker finished with seven points, while Matt Ray, Matt Bauer and Jesse Ruisch added six. Dahlir Adams tallied four points and Joey Gerbasio rounded out the scoring with two.

“Games and competition like this will help us out in the long run,” Stephens said. “This is why our schedule has been the way it is this year. We have played really quality competition so far and we haven’t even hit 2022 yet.”

Parkland (5-2 overall) went on to play Pocono Mountain West on Wednesday’s second day of the tournament. That game was played after Press deadline.

The Trojans’ next game will be against Liberty in EPC play at home next Tuesday, Jan. 4.