One state title down, one to go

The season might be over for the Penn men’s basketball team, but for one Quaker commit, there is still a championship to win.

Coach Jerome Allen’s local recruit Xavier Harris and his teammates at Constitution High are in the midst of their own March Madness in the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association Class AA playoffs.

In its quarterfinal matchup with Reading Central Catholic, Constitution found itself down 40-30 with six minutes remaining after a seven-and-a-half minute scoring drought. But Harris responded with a jumper from the right wing to help spark the Generals, who erased their deficit and won, 55-53.

After the bucket, Harris’ teammate Daiquan Walker exploded with three treys and Abdul King helped put in the game-winning layup with 1.3 seconds remaining.

Harris finished the game with six points and six rebounds. Constitution — with its two-year-old basketball program — is seeking its first state championship and will face fellow Pub League rival Math, Civics & Sciences on Tuesday. Harris’ squad is 1-1 this season against the Mighty Elephants.

Though he is focusing on the state championship, Harris is also waiting to hear if he has improved his SAT scores by the approximately 30 points he needs to gain admission to Penn.

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While Xavier Harris finishes his own run to the title, Greg Louis is already looking forward to the future.

The 6-foot-6 power forward out of William T. Dwyer High School in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., played with teammate Vic Adams at the Palm Beach All-Star Basketball Classic this past weekend.

Louis concluded a successful season in which he helped the Panthers capture the Florida Class 5A state title — their first since 2005.

Dwyer, who was ranked No. 15 nationally by MaxPreps for a large portion of the season, finished the year 32-1.

The final pitted Dwyer against Lake Wales, but Louis and company started well and didn’t look back.

The Panthers jumped out to an early 16-point lead on 70 percent field goal shooting in the first quarter en route to a comfortable 72-57 win. Louis finished with 10 points and 12 rebounds.

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Allen’s latest commit, Camryn Crocker, had the toughest postseason among his future teammates.

Crocker’s Los Alamitos squad bowed out of the California Interscholastic Federation Southern Section Division 1AA playoffs in the second round.

Crocker opened up the postseason with a bang, scoring 27 points ­— including 11 in the third quarter — in a first-round matchup with Lynwood High School.

But despite scoring 15 points, the senior captain could not prevent Alamitos from falling in the next round to Corona Centennial, 59-55.

In his final high-school season, Crocker averaged 18.9 points per game.

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