Seneca Valley's Aly Eagle dishes the ball off Saturday afternoon during the Lady Raiders' 55-25 loss to top-seeded Norwin in the WPIALClass AAAA basketball playoffs.

ROSS TWP — Saturday's WPIAL Quad A boys basketball playoff game resembled a quiz show.

And the Upper St. Clair Panthers had all the right answers.

USC diffused every run Seneca Valley managed with a clutch shot of its own as the Panthers pulled out a 66-52 first-round win at North Hills High School.

SV's girls also saw their season come to an end with a 55-25 loss to Norwin at the same venue.

In the boys' contest, SV's John Fitzpatrick pulled the Raiders to within 52-48 with a conventional 3-point play with 5:21 remaining in the game.

But, as they managed to do all day, the Panthers fired right back — this time with a 3-pointer from junior guard Pete Serio, his first and only field goal of the day, to make the score 55-48.

The Raiders cut their deficit to four points one more time with Matt Vogt's 2-pointer that made it 56-52 with 3:34 left.

This time, the Panthers hit 5-of-6 free throws from three different players in the next 1:25 to build their lead back to 60-52.

The Raiders (17-8) were unable to muster any offense the rest of the way.

"Every time the game got close, they hit a big shot," said SV coach Vic Giannotta. "We figured coming in that if we could hold (Christian Shea) to single digits, we'd be all right."

Shea, a junior guard, is the Panthers' leading scorer at 16 points per game.

The Raiders held him to just eight points, but SV had no answer for USC's supporting cast, which was led by Jon Austin and Dan Simpson, who both tallied 17 points.

"We knew that Seneca Valley would come after us in a zone (defense), but we were prepared for it," said Panthers' coach Danny Holzer. "They're a really good team, but I thought we played the better second half and it was because we were prepared.

"And we received big shots from so many different kids," he added.

USC (20-5) led just 26-24 at halftime, but opened the third quarter with a 13-5 run for a 39-29 edge.

The Raiders looked to make a run of their own with baskets by Dan Rohm and C.J. Brown. But in both instances, the Panthers found a wide open Garrett Del Re, who laid in two points before the Raiders defense could get back down the floor to defend its goal.

Brown led the Raiders with 16 points and Fitzpatrick added 15.

They both fouled out of the game late in the fourth quarter.

The defeat brings to an end SV's historic season.

Never before had a Raiders' team won more than 14 games in a single year and SV put up 17 wins this season.

"Absolutely, it was a great season," said Giannotta. "I told the guys that unless you win the championship, you're going to feel like this sooner or later."

Norwin 55, Seneca Valley 25As members of WPIAL's Section 3, Seneca Valley is used to playing in low-scoring games.But on Saturday, the Raiders' opponent had no intention of possibly winning a game by scoring in the 30s.Norwin (24-1) received 20 points from senior forward/center Lindsey Loutsenheizer and 17 more from junior guard Emily Duncan in a 55-25 first-round playoff victory.Loutsenheizer stands 6-feet-1 and impressed SV coach Kelly Mathews."She's the most skilled post player I've seen this year," Mathews said. "She's very good with her back to the basket.""Seneca Valley might be smaller, but they're a feisty team," said Knights' coach Bob Shrader. "We knew coming in that Loutsenheizer or Duncan could not lay an egg today."Those fears were quickly put to rest.The first quarter saw Loutsenheizer (nine points) and Duncan (six) combine for all of the Knights' points as SV trailed 15-9 entering the second period.The Raiders received seven points from Jackie Mangola in that first period, but the senior scored just two points on free throws the rest of the game."We ran a couple of quick-hitters to (Mangola) early," said Mathews. "But we weren't able to do much of anything after that."Trailing 26-15 at the break, the Raiders watched the Knights open the second half with a 7-0 run.SV (10-15) missed its first six field goal attempts and didn't score in the third quarter until Catherine Messmer's 2-point bucket with 1:28 left in the period, and that only cut Norwin's lead to 33-17.Unable to stop the Knights, SV chose to put their opponent at the free throw line, but the Knights were an impressive 13-of-14 from the charity stripe in the second half.For the game, Norwin hit 23-of-26 free throws."Norwin was just the better team," said Mathews. "But I'm proud of our girls. I'd rather our season come to an end in the playoffs than not get there at all."<B>BoysUPPER ST. CLAIR 66Jon Austin 4 8-9 17, Dan Simpson 6 5-6 17, Christian Shea 3 0-1 8, Brett McCormick 2 1-3 6, Pete Serio 1 3-4 6, Steve Lias 1 1-2 3, Garrett Del Re 4 1-2 9, Zach Joyce 0 0-0 0, Shane Brennan 0 0-0 0. </B>Totals: 21 19-27 66.<B>SENECA VALLEY 52John Fitzpatrick 4 7-13 15, C.J. Brown 6 4-6 16, Nate Herrmann 3 0-0 7, Dan Rohm 1 0-0 2, Matt Vogt 1 1-2 3, Dustin Anewalt 1 3-5 5, Christian Durbin 1 0-1 2, Tony Treser 1 0-0 2, Sean Gress 0 0-0 0, Ryan Turner 0 0-0 0.</B> Totals: 18 15-27 52.<B>Upper St. Clair 17 9 17 23—66Seneca Valley 13 11 14 14—523-point goals:</B> Upper St. Clair 5 (Shea 2, Austin, McCormick, Serio); Seneca Valley 1 (Herrmann).<B>GirlsNORWIN 55Lindsey Loutsenheizer 8 4-6 20, Casey Batey 1 4-4 6, Emily Duncan 4 9-9 17, Andie Kyros 0 3-4 3, Shelley Springer 1 1-1 3, Nicky Brenner 0 2-2 2, Maura Znavor 1 0-0 2, Brittney Bargiel 1 0-0 2, Jen Zatezalo 0 0-0 0, Cassidy Kravec 0 0-0 0. </B>Totals: 16 23-26 55.<B>SENECA VALLEY 25Aly Eagle 1 0-0 2, Megan Gebrosky 1 0-1 2, Alyssa Miller 1 0-0 2, Kelsey Patsilevas 2 0-2 4, Jackie Mangola 3 3-3 9, Catherine Messmer 3 0-1 6, Kara Moyer 0 0-0 0, Shayna Elser 0 0-0 0, Gabby Allen 0 0-0 0.</B> Totals: 11 3-7 25.<B>Norwin 15 11 11 18—55Seneca Valley 9 6 4 6—253-point goals:</B> None.

The Raiders' C.J. Brown (23) drives on Upper St. Clair defender Jon Austin during Seneca Valley's 66-52 boys basketball playoff loss to the Panthers. Brown had 16 points in the game.