City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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In a tie game against Chichester with 17 seconds remaining, Penn Wood’s Clyde Jones called timeout. The Patriots' head coach had just watched his team give up a 10-point lead in the final three minutes of the fourth quarter, but had an opportunity to draw up a final play to beat the Eagles.

Instead, he got a travel under the bucket with 3.2 seconds left on the clock. And then things got much worse.

Chichester’s Jamai Womack caught the ensuing inbounds pass on the right sideline, spun away from two defenders and found sophomore Da’Quan Granberry just outside the 3-point arc. Granberry took one dribble and put it up from 17 feet, just beating the final buzzer.

Down it went, giving the Eagles a 69-67 win.

“There were 17 seconds left when they called timeout, I said if we get the ball, we’re going. Whoever gets it, goes,” Chichester head coach Buzzy Wood said. “I saw Jamai got it and stop, threw it up to Da’Quan, who caught it, took a dribble and threw it. I looked up and it went in. Crazy, crazy scene.”

Granberry, a soft-spoken sophomore, had a game-high 23 points in a wild, back-and-forth Del-Val League matchup that saw each team turn it over north of 20 times, with leads exchanged back and forth throughout the 40-minute affair.

Penn Wood (8-8, 3-3 Del-Val) trailed by two after one quarter and three at the half, but rallied to lead by as many as eight during a third quarter that saw their pressure defense force turnover after turnover, led by junior guard Kairi Jones (six steals) and senior guard Calvin Melton (five steals).

After Chichester tied it up early in the fourth quarter, more forced turnovers by PW helped the lead expand back out to its largest, 65-55 with 4:17 remaining.

“They’re just so tough, man, they just worked that press so good,” Wood said. “It’s tough to get out, and you saw in the first half we broke it no problem. In the second half, we threw it away, it’s like a machine, they turn up their pressure.”

Five Patriots players finished in double figures, led by junior Jay Fitzgerald (15 points) and junior forward Pernell Ghee (13 points), who had eight points during that third quarter.

But that was where things went swiftly downhill for the Patriots. Four foul shots from senior guard Derrick Welles for the last of his 20 points got the Eagles within six, and a steal-and-layup by Eric Montenez (18 points) made it a two-point game with 2:00 to play.

In addition to the game-winning bucket, Granberry also had the game-tying 3-pointer shortly after that, the third triple of the day for the 6-foot-3, 170-pound guard.

“It feels great,” he said of his big day. “I don’t know what to say.”

Afterwards, Clyde Jones was searching for answers after his team dropped its third game out of the last four played, including a loss Monday to a Harrisburg side that was missing its top two players and several other usual rotation members.

That final travel was just the last mistake in a game full of them--balls thrown away, passes mishandled, lane violations. While many of Chichester’s 20-some turnovers can be attributed to Penn Wood’s full-court press, the Patriots faced no such pressure from the Eagles and still managed to equal them in that department.

“Little dumb, minor details that this group just doesn’t take care off,” Jones said. “It’s what I deal with night in and night out, and that’s why we’re 8-8 with a team that you think is talented, we’re 8-8 because we don’t make game-winning plays and we don’t take care of details.”

The win gives Chichester (10-5, 3-2 Del-Val) one victory shy of its total in the previous two years combined, despite Wood’s having to start two sophomores and a junior in a tough league that features former state champions Penn Wood and Chester among its six members.

It’s a program that hasn’t been to the district playoffs in eight seasons, and Wood is hoping that this could be the year that makes the difference. His bunch looks the part, led by seniors Womack and Welles, along with Montenez and Granberry, giving them athleticism and scoring ability all over the court.

“We want to get to the playoffs, this makes us 10-5 now, a win like that helps us out in the playoffs,” Wood said. “It should move us up in the standings.”

There’s no time to rest for Chichester, who turns around on Friday with a rescheduled game against Chester, a 5 PM tipoff to beat the snow in a game that was originally supposed to be played earlier in the week.

As big as beating Penn Wood on its home court was for the Eagles, the task will be even tougher to take on Chester at the Clip Joint.

“We beat Glen Mills, we beat (Penn Wood), we’ve got to beat Chester High and make a name for ourselves,” Womack.