It’s playoff time for local teams heading into the District 11 basketball tournament, as Liberty and Freedom both kick off this week’s action on the hard court.

The Hurricanes started the week with Tuesday’s contest against Pocono Mountain West (12-10) at home in an eight-nine matchup.

The two teams last met on January 3 and Liberty (12-10) blew them off the court courtesy of a 72-49 victory, but it’s safe to assume that things won’t be that easy this time around.

Liberty head coach Chad Landis is hoping that the strides the team has made over the course of the year can come to fruition now.

“As happy as I was with the end of the season, our big issue is still consistency,” said Landis. “We have not shown the ability to compete against the good teams for all four quarters. We have been using our time trying to work on things both on offense and defense that will help us be more consistent.”

Should the ‘Canes get a victory on Tuesday, they’ll face top-seeded Emmaus (20-5) in Saturday’s quarterfinal round. The Hornets defeated Liberty earlier this year 48-31, but Landis hopes that with the time off to prepare his team will be ready for any scenario this week.

“First thing will be overcoming this long layoff,” he said. “It will be two weeks in between games. So I am sure we will be a little rusty. We will have to make the adjustment from regular season games to playoff games. No one wants their season to end at this point so everyone you play gives a great effort. We will need to be able to raise our level of play.”

Freedom (16-7) comes into the tourney as the third seed, as they received a first round bye. They’ll await the winner of six-eleven matchup between Easton and East Stroudsburg South. Easton has been a thorn in Freedom’s side this year beating them in both divisional contests this season. The Pates will play Saturday at 4 p.m. at Allen. Should Liberty win on Tuesday they would play Emmaus at Allen on Saturday at 7 p.m.