New coach Cory Cesare had little time to celebrate taking over as a high school coach for the first time. He got the gig less than two months before the season opener after Jerry Lloyd, who took over the helm for the 2020 season, resigned over regulations that required coaches to wear masks during practices and games.

With little time to make any substantial changes, Cesare took his team into the season, and it promptly rattled off three straight wins. The Tigers were 4-1 when we all hung our new 2022 calendars on the wall, but a streak that saw Northwestern Lehigh lose six of its next eight games threatened to take the season down the drain.

Things began to turn around and the Tigers won their final three games of the regular season which got them into both the Colonial League and District 11 tournaments with a 10-8 record.

“I think that the guys learned a lot about themselves during that slide,” said Cesare after Northwestern Lehigh’s season ended with a loss to Bethlehem Catholic during districts. “We really hung together and kept working to straighten things out and they responded in time to salvage the season and get to compete in some playoff basketball.”

Senior Dylan Witkowski finished the season averaging a team-high 12 points per game for Northwestern. Classmate Ethan Lazarus averaged 7.5 points per game and got hot late in the season, helping push the Tigers over the finish line. The third senior on the roster was Josh Heilman, who came off the bench and gave the team a true scrapper on the boards, something they needed.

“We’re a young team, but the three seniors that we have were terrific this season,” said Cesare. “They helped the team in every way possible and provided leadership through the tough times when we needed it most.”

In the Colonial League playoffs, Northwestern was matched up against Palmerton in the first round and fell to the Blue Bombers 63-50. The loss gave Northwestern some added time to rest and get ready for districts where they ran into a tough Bethlehem Catholic team and fell 50-45 to end their first season under Cesare.

While the team would have liked to enjoy more success in the postseason, the players can at least look forward to putting the experience that the young players developed to their benefit next season. The team will still be young but will have varsity experience in spots where it lacked it during this season.

Juniors Cayden Fitch and Cade Christopher figure to step into the leading offensive roles for Cesare in their senior seasons. Christopher was second on the team in scoring with 8.5 points per game and Fitch finished with 6.2 points per game. Freshman Gavin Nelson dropped in just under six points per game and came through with 23 points in a late-season win over Palisades.

Freshman Eli Zimmerman proved himself to be a pesky defender making up for his lack of size with great quickness. Another freshman, Jack Mauro, saw a decent amount of playing time as did sophomore Ethan Kozlowski. All will have that experience and a summer’s worth of basketball to help the Tigers in the 2022 season.

“I think we had a number of guys really step up and get some time on the court and they took advantage of that,” said Cesare. “They will come into next season more prepared to play at the varsity level. It was important to get these guys some playing time, knowing that they might take a few lumps along the way, but they will be better players down the road because of what they learned this year.”