The 2019-20 edition of the Emmaus boys basketball team has a lot of youth and inexperience. from 12th-year head coach Steve Yoder’s perspective.

After losing a majority of its top scorers last season, including all five starters, the Green Hornets feature plenty of fresh, new faces this year under 12th-year head coach Steve Yoder.

The young Emmaus team showed plenty of positive signs in its Eastern Pennsylvania Conference opening game, leading for nearly half of the contest before falling to rival Parkland 61-49 last Tuesday night at Parkland High School.

“As a coaching staff we never want to lose any games,” said Yoder. “But there were a lot of good things that happened [against Parkland] that we can take away and feel good about. We’re a young team, but we definitely made progress and can certainly get better and improve upon this game.”

For almost 20 minutes Emmaus (2-3 overall, 2-1 EPC) had the upper hand. Parkland led 7-6 early on, but saw the Green Hornets hold the advantage for a majority of the first quarter until a basket by the Trojans’ Nick Rappa at the end of the frame gave the Trojans a 16-15 lead after one.

Parkland (3-0, 3-0) led by as much as four (23-19) in the second quarter, but Emmaus closed out the stanza on a 10-4 run to go up 29-27 at halftime. There were two ties and three lead changes in the third quarter as Parkland jumped out to its biggest lead of the game, 43-37, heading into the final quarter.

That is where the Trojans took control of the game, playing their best basketball of the night.

Parkland outscored Emmaus 18-12 in the final eight minutes and from a 34-34 tie midway through the third quarter, ended the game on a 27-15 run to close it out.

“We got cold from the field,” said Yoder on the team’s offensive struggles in the second half, scoring just 20 points in the final two quarters. “Credit them, they picked up their intensity and really made it hard for us. We had some good individual performances, but we needed just a little bit more.”

Hornet junior Danny Bohman led all scorers with 26 points and his confidence of being the only returning varsity contributor from last year showed, as he shot away from long range, connecting on four three-pointers, some were a few steps behind the line. Jayden Walsh tallied 15 points as the duo combined for 41 of the team’s 49 points.

Emmaus would win its next two league games, against Northampton (48-44) and Nazareth (51-50) to get back on track. The Green Hornets are at Central Catholic on Friday night.