Bethlehem Catholic’s basketball team has fallen into a lull over the past month, but the Hawks will be back in full swing to close out the season.

With only three games over the last three weeks due to COVID and the holiday break, Bethlehem Catholic (5-2) had plenty of downtime on their hands.

Since their December 17 loss to Central Catholic, the Hawks have played three games in 23 days, with their most recent coming in Saturday’s 72-47 victory over Pocono Mountain East.

That all changes this week as the Hawks embark on a four-game slate, starting with Monday’s victory over East Stroudsburg North.

Head coach Scott McClary admitted this most recent stretch of down time has been frustrating.

“It has been hard with only playing three games in three weeks,” said McClary. “It especially showed in that first one against Dallas (a 79-62 loss on December 30), where we looked behind a step in all that we did. The next two games we felt much better about. Now, the schedule gets really jammed in. Players love that, but coaches, not so much. It can cause problems for health and overuse, it leaves very little room to reschedule any future postponements due to weather or COVID.”

Outside of Monday’s win, the Hawks face Liberty (Tuesday), Dieruff (Thursday) and Nazareth (Saturday) this week.

The schedule from here on out will be tight for the Hawks, which leaves little room for practice time.

“It does not allow you to get into practice and work on things that you identify need improvement,” said McClary. “You have to change how you prepare and use games as practices almost. Our regular season is set to close out with a four game week, three game week, five game week and then two games.

“Our injuries are still a really big factor for us as our combined JV/varsity roster has 17 players and six of them are out right now due to injury. Little to no practice time for them to get up to speed, which is also a big factor. COVID has just made everything different these last 2 years and we need to find a way forward.”