First place will be on the line in two of the highest divisions and ranked teams will go head-to-head in four different gyms Monday night as the District 2 basketball regular season speeds toward its conclusion.
Abington Heights plays at Scranton to see which will take the lead in Lackawanna League Division 1 boys into a difficult final night of the regular season.
Wilkes-Barre Area will go to Pittston Area to see if it can claim the Wyoming Valley Conference Division 1 girls title or if it will yield the lead to the Lady Patriots while making a playoff likely.
Other quality boys matchups have Old Forge at Holy Cross, Elk Lake at Riverside and Forest City at Blue Ridge.
Abington Heights has won seven straight to climb into a tie with defending champion and early leader Scranton with both teams at 9-2. The Comets, the No. 5 Big School in the My City Mortgage Super Six Basketball Power Rankings of District 2 teams, are 14-5 overall. The second-ranked Knights are 17-2.
Scranton Prep, which also is coming on strong and grabbed a piece of first place for part of last week, remains in contention.
If Scranton wins Monday, Scranton Prep can force a three- or two-way tie for first by beating the Knights in Wednesday’s finale.
If Abington Heights wins Monday, it still has to face Division 2 second-place North Pocono, which just got its top player, Ryan Ruddy, back from injury. In that scenario, a North Pocono win would drop Abington Heights into a first-place tie with Wednesday’s Scranton-Scranton Prep winner.
Wilkes-Barre (11-1 in the division, 17-2) can win WVC Division 1 girls, if it repeats an earlier win over Pittston Area (11-2, 19-2). The Wolfpack is ranked fourth and the Lady Patriots sixth among Big School girls teams.
If it loses at Pittston Area, Wilkes-Barre Area will need to win at Crestwood Tuesday night to force a tie and playoff.
Elk Lake and Old Forge each take their seven-game winning streaks on the road for games against higher-ranked Small Schools boys teams.
No. 5 Elk Lake (15-5) is at No. 3 Riverside (13-6) in a non-league game.
No. 4 Old Forge (6-4, 12-7) is at No. 2 Holy Cross (8-2, 15-5) in Lackawanna Division 3. Holy Cross has won 11 straight and will be trying to keep pace with division leader Mid Valley, which plays at Carbondale.
Sixth-ranked Blue Ridge (9-2, 13-7) is at home. The Raiders need a win over Forest City (7-3, 8-11) in a meeting between the second- and third-place teams in Lackawanna Division 4 boys to keep alive hopes of catching Elk Lake, which has already clinched at least a tie.
The full District 2 basketball schedule can be found at: https://nepabasketball.com/composite?d=2022-02-14.
