Catasauqua’s boys basketball team’s regular season and postseason will begin the same way. That is, the Rough Riders will meet the same opponent.

The Roughies ended their regular season against Southern Lehigh Tuesday at home, and they will then open the Colonial League playoffs against the same team Friday night at home. Catty is the fourth seed in the league playoffs and Southern Lehigh is the fifth seed.

Head coach Eric Snyder believes his team will face some tests ahead. The Roughies began the week with an overall 16-5 record. They defeated Southern Lehigh, which began the week with a 14-7 record, 62-49, in their earlier meeting Dec. 23 this season.

Catty, the defending district champion, entered the week with four-straight victories, downing their last four opponents by 25 points or more. The Roughies lost in the league final to Northwestern last year, defeating Notre Dame and Bangor on their way there.

Snyder isn’t taking anything for granted.

“We have our work cut out for us,” stressed Snyder. “Our last four games have been by the mercy rule, but now we will be playing all teams with winning records in the playoffs.

“Playing Southern Lehigh back-to-back like that is a very interesting situation.”

Snyder also has been impressed with the play of senior Dylan Lorah, who replaced injured starting center senior Caiden Weaver, who went down with a knee injury.

“Caiden was a much better defender, he had a good jumper and took charges,” noted Snyder. “He was very accurate around the basket shooting layups, which was his specialty after our guys would drive and dish the ball off to him. We miss Caiden Weaver‘s defense.

“Dylan Lorah has been playing excellently, but he gives us a different set of skills. Dylan is physically thicker. He plays the post extremely well and is a very good outside shooter and will drive to the basket and score. He uses his outside-inside shooting skills to his advantage.

“They are two different kinds of players, each one contributing significantly to our team.”

Snyder is confident his team can play good fundamental basketball and make another deep postseason run. The Roughies advanced to the second round of the state playoffs last season.

“It is now playoff time and we have to step up,” stressed Snyder. “We have to make sure we take care of the ball. We can’t be careless with the ball, have to make our foul shots, and have to play good team defense.”