It felt like March at the Geigle Complex here Saturday, and not only because of the relatively balmy weather.

The Geigle Classic Shoot-Out at Reading High School was a five-game dress rehearsal for high school basketball's postseason.

McCaskey looked ready for prime time in fighting its way past Cedar Cliff, 66-58.

"When we come to play, we can play with anybody," coach Steve Powell said of his 14-4 Red Tornado. "When we don't come to play, we can lose to anybody. That's been proven."

Cedar Cliff (15-3) isn't just anybody The Colts were a state-tournament team a year ago, finishing third in the Class AAAA District Three playoffs.

Four starters are back. Their only losses before Saturday were to undefeated Hershey, a big, physical club that's been one of the stories of the year in the midstate.

Cedar Cliff has several lean, athletic and skilled kids in the 6-foot-4, 6-5 range. The Colts can cause some matchup nightmares. But they have no post players and few of what we conventional folk think of as guards.

It's a team McCaskey can disrupt with its quickness, but it took a while for the Tornado to get the motor revved. Cedar Cliff led 16-7 early, 18-10 after a quarter. At halftime, the Colts had a 21-7 rebounding edge.

Powell's unconventional, but effective, reaction was to go to a smaller lineup.

"They're long," he said of the Colts, "but we didn't think they were a great ball-handling team. We went to our strength, which is our guards, our quickness."

So the Colts would get a little margin, and the Tornado would close it with score-press-turnover-score runs. McCaskey even played some zone, primarily to seal off Christo Majok, a 6-5 senior who usually brings the ball up for the Colts.

"We wanted to keep him out of the paint," Powell said. "That way, he becomes a distributor, not a facilitator."

But McCaskey never led, until Sha-Ki Staten scored inside, off a Luis Fuentes drive-and-dish, with seven minutes left.

McCaskey's hyperactive three-guard trio of Aaron Swinton, Diante Cherry and Fuentes was now in attack mode, getting to the rim (and thus the foul line) or finding McCaskey bigs off the dribble.

Cedar Cliff still clung to a 58-57 lead, on a Will Hopkins jumper, with 81 seconds left. But the Colts never scored again.

A Calvert Gantz free throw, after another drive-and-dish, tied it.

Both Cherry and Aaron Swinton then flew at Hopkins, who traveled. Powell called time with 48 seconds left, and the Tornado got Devonne Pinkard a clean look at a three. Kaboom. That was the blow that turned it for good.

Cliff missed a three, and Cherry dug out the long rebound. Swinton made three of four at the line, and Gantz closed with a flying dunk at the buzzer.

Cedar Cliff had 18 turnovers and came away with some things to work on. Majok led the Colts with 23 points.

The teams combined to make 29 of 33 free throws, but Cedar Cliff didn't make a three-pointer. Critically, McCaskey had seven.

Swinton led McCaskey with 17 points. Cherry had 11. Seven McCaskey players scored five or more.

"We've got weapons," Powell said.

In a few weeks, they can start firing them for keeps.

In earlier shoot-out games here Saturday, Pocono Mountain West edged Central Dauphin East 72-68, and Berks Catholic held off Philadelphia Electrical, 57-49.

Contact Sunday News Assistant Sports Editor Mike Gross at mgross@lnpnews.com.