Growing up and playing basketball at Penn Hills, there was always this weird relationship between us and the City of Pittsburgh.

The city kids came to everything we had.

Our school events? They came. Our prom? They came. And that Penn Hills Kennywood picnic? Man, that might have been the biggest school picnic in Pittsburgh. The whole damn city was at Kennywood when Penn Hills had its picnic.

But basketball? Oh, they hated us.

It didn’t matter how good Penn Hills was. We could’ve been 28-0, ranked No. 1 in Pennsylvania and beating teams by 30, and somebody from the City League would’ve found a reason to say: “Penn Hills ain’t that good.”

That was just the relationship.

And the biggest knock was always the same. Penn Hills was soft.

 

I Wanted the City League Bad

During my years at Penn Hills, we rarely played City League schools. I played Allderdice my senior year and we beat them pretty good, but I wanted the big dogs.

I wanted Perry. I wanted Brashear. I wanted Schenley. I wanted Peabody. Those were the names you constantly heard when talking about City League basketball back then.

And I wanted to see for myself. More importantly, I wanted them to see us. Because by my senior year, I was tired of hearing what Penn Hills supposedly couldn’t do against city teams.

Especially because I was having the best season of my life.

I was a national Top 100 recruit. I had signed with West Virginia. I was leading the WPIAL in scoring. We had just won the Class AAAA WPIAL championship. And during that championship run, I broke the WPIAL playoff scoring record with 147 points in four games.

I was also chasing something crazy: 1,000 points in one season.

After we won the WPIAL championship, I was only about 60 points away. My buzz around Pittsburgh was probably as big as it had ever been.

Hell, the McDonald’s in Penn Hills even gave me my own value meal. The McFino Meal.

I can’t even lie to y’all: I was the top dog at the time. And yeah, a lot of girls liked me. Especially some of the city girls. So naturally that added even more fuel to the Penn Hills-City League trash talk.

But none of that mattered until we actually played.

 

Finally: Penn Hills vs. Peabody

We won our first-round state playoff game.

Peabody won theirs.

And when I realized who was next, I remember thinking: Finally.

Penn Hills, the WPIAL champion. Peabody, the City League champion. Now there were no more hypotheticals. No more arguing. No more “Penn Hills is soft.” No more “the City League would do this to y’all.”

We were finally going to settle it on the court.

Somebody was going home sick. The anticipation was crazy.

We played on a Saturday afternoon at Franklin Regional.

It was actually a great location for us because Murrysville wasn’t far from Penn Hills. Franklin Regional was in our section, so I had already played in that gym. And it was a new gym at the time.

Basketball players know exactly what I mean when I say this: That court was beautiful. Not slippery. Good rims. And that floor had some spring to it.

The place was standing-room only. You could feel that this wasn’t just another playoff game.

This was Penn Hills versus the City.

 

I Had Butterflies in My Ass

I’m not going to rewrite history and act like I walked into every gym completely fearless.

I got nervous before games. Almost every game. But this one? I was extra nervous. I’m talking butterflies in my ass.

I was unusually quiet during warmups. And looking around, I could tell some of my teammates were nervous too. Some might’ve even been a little scared.

But here’s the thing about me: Once the lights came on, I loved the big stage. The bigger the crowd, the more pressure, the more people talking trash—the more I wanted the ball.

And Peabody brought all of that.

Their crowd was talking crazy. Their players were talking. And they had every right to be confident because Peabody was GOOD.

They were well coached and had some serious players. The Burton brothers. Chaz Peacock. And their best player, Will Summers, was a monster inside. This wasn’t some overrated team we were supposed to walk through.

They were the City League champions for a reason.

 

The Game Never Let Me Relax

The game went back and forth. And I mean the whole game. There was never a moment where I thought, “Yeah, we got these dudes.”

Nope.

I had anxiety damn near the entire game. Every possession felt important.

At one point, I got loose for a breakaway dunk. BOOM. The gym exploded. That’s when I really felt the momentum. You could feel that Penn Hills crowd thinking: We got these dudes.

But Peabody wouldn’t go away.

Eventually, the game was tied with seconds remaining. And the ball was in my hands.

Exactly where I wanted it.

 

The Ref Gave Me the Star Treatment 

We cleared it out. Iso. I drove to the basket. Contact.

WHISTLE.

And I’m going to keep it 100. It was probably a 50/50 call. Charge? Block? Could’ve gone either way.

But that referee gave me the star treatment that day.

Peabody’s crowd went CRAZY. They were furious.

I went to the line and hit both free throws. Penn Hills up two.

But it wasn’t over.

Peabody came back down the floor and got a look. And unfortunately for us, the guy getting the look was Chaz Peacock. Chaz could shoot his ass off.

He got an open three.

When that ball left his hands, I’m not even going to lie: I was scared as hell. It looked good. For that split second, everything slowed down.

Then… MISS.

Game over. Penn Hills beat Peabody. The WPIAL champion had beaten the City League champion.

YEP. I TOLD Y’ALL.

I can’t explain how good that felt.

Obviously, winning another state playoff game mattered. But this one was different. This was personal. For years, I had heard that Penn Hills couldn’t mess with the City League. That we were suburban kids. That we were soft. That City League basketball was different. That I wouldn’t be doing all that scoring against them.

Well… We finally played. And we won.

Yep. Told y’all.

The place turned into chaos. Penn Hills fans stormed the court. People were everywhere.

With the history between Penn Hills and the city and all the trash talking that had gone on, I’ll admit there was a moment where I didn’t know if a huge fight might break out.

Thankfully, it didn’t. Just basketball. Trash talk. Bragging rights. And a packed gym full of people who had just watched one hell of a game.

 

I’ll Give Peabody Their Props

Now I have to give Peabody credit for one thing. They defended me better statistically than anybody else had during that playoff run.

I finished with 28 points. That was the first playoff game that year where I didn’t score at least 30.

So congratulations, Peabody. Y’all held me to 28.

Respect.

I thought the next chapter was going to be even crazier because I wanted Schenley badly. If you knew Pittsburgh basketball back then, you understood what playing Schenley would’ve meant. I wanted the Spartans.

Bad.

But Uniontown upset them. I was actually disappointed.

We had already beaten Uniontown in the WPIAL semifinals, so I knew playing them again would be dangerous. They were going to feel like they owed us one.

But that’s another story.

 

Penn Hills Was Basically the City Anyway

Looking back now, I laugh about how serious that Penn Hills-versus-the-City stuff was to us.

Because geographically, it never made much sense. Cross the street from parts of Penn Hills and you’re basically in the City of Pittsburgh.

We listened to the same music. Knew the same people. Went to the same parties. Dated the same girls. City kids were always in Penn Hills and Penn Hills kids were always in the city.

But put a basketball between us? Now suddenly we were enemies.

That’s what made that era so much fun. There were real rivalries. Real school pride. Real arguments about who could actually play. And you couldn’t settle everything through Instagram clips, rankings or Twitter debates.

Sometimes you had to meet in a packed gym on a Saturday afternoon and find out.

I’ll always have love for the City League. But I’m still going to remind my City League people of one thing: When Penn Hills finally got its shot at the City League champion… we handled our business.

And 25 years later, I can finally admit something else.

That blocking call?

Yeah….. That might’ve been a charge.