For one half, the pace of the game was exactly what Mc-Keesport coach Corey Gadson wanted against Mt. Lebanon. The score was in the low 20s and McKeesport trailed heavily favored Mt. Lebanon by only three points.

Then came a few McKeesport turnovers, some missed shots, an intentional foul and a technical foul. Suddenly, it was a runaway pace for Mt. Lebanon.

Mt. Lebanon blitzed Mc-Keesport in the first four minutes of the second half, turned a close game into a rout and breezed to a 56-44 victory in a WPIAL Class AAAA quarterfinal Saturday afternoon at Baldwin.

The win puts Mt. Lebanon (23-1) into the semifinals for the fourth time in six years. The Blue Devils, the Post-Gazette's No. 1-ranked Class AAAA team since the preseason, will play neighboring rival Upper St. Clair Wednesday.

"It was our strategy to just try and stay close," Gadson said. "Our goal was to win the first four minutes of the second half. We get an intentional foul and a technical, and that's a big momentum switch right there. ... We were hopeful we could make a run, but they made the run."

Mt. Lebanon led, 23-20, at halftime and it looked like this game might be similar to the Blue Devils' first-round 33-31 victory against Shaler. Then it was like the Blue Devils decided to use some of that snow piled up outside the Baldwin gym for a snowball effect.

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Make it seven in a row

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Mt. Lebanon went on a 15-1 run to start the second half and opened up a 38-21 lead with 4:50 left in the third quarter. Mc-Keesport (18-5) missed 15 of its first 18 shots in the second half and struggled some against Mt. Lebanon's pressure defense.

Mt. Lebanon's third-quarter run enabled the Blue Devils to run their winning streak against McKeesport to seven consecutive contests in the past six seasons.

"I think our bigs [inside players] weren't doing much in the first half," Mt. Lebanon coach Joe David said.

"We have 6-foot-8 and 6-6 guys and we were playing like we were 6-2 and 6-foot. I don't think we used that size to our advantage at all. Then we came out with some fire in the second half, got to the rim and Paul Lang was all over the boards."

Lang, a 6-foot-5 junior, scored nine points in the first 3:10 of the third quarter and finished with 16 points and 11 rebounds.

"He's a very underrated player," David said of Lang. "He's the most productive guy we have when you talk about everything -- assists, steals, points and rebounds."

Senior guard Evan Pierce scored a team-high 18 points, with three 3-pointers. He had 11 points in the first half. Senior guard Ty-Meer Brown, a University of Connecticut football recruit, led McKeesport with 13 points, but had only two in the second half.

For the game, McKeesport shot only 30 percent (14 of 47) and was outrebounded, 48-31.

"We've been in slower-paced games before and have overcome it," Lang said. "I think the main thing that helped us in the second half was our pressure on defense and the speed we were running at."

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