City of Basketball Love

Will Slover (@WillSlover31)
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When Germantown Academy and Malvern Prep met on Friday night, most people were expecting a low-scoring defensive battle. They got the exact opposite.

After 32 minutes of fast-paced, back-and-forth action at Germantown Academy, the Patriots topped the Friars 88-84 to take over sole possession of first place in the Inter-Ac league in a game that saw four players from each squad hit double figures.

Will Powers led the attack for Malvern, as he finished with 26. Junior guard O’Shaan Allison and senior forward Mike Hollingsworth also chipped in with 14 each and sophomore baseball standout Brady Devereaux, who is committed to Wake Forest, has 12 as well.The scoring effort for the Friars was great, but not great enough.

“We got them playing at our pace, our tempo,” said Malvern coach John Harmatuk. “They scored 28 points at the free-throw line and we scored 10. At GA, in a league game, we can’t get outscored by 18 points at the free-throw line.”

Scoring 28 points at the free-throw line wasn’t all the GA offensive attack did well on Friday, as they also shot 28-of-52 from the field and 4-of-9 from deep.

Kyle McCloskey headed the charge with 26 points and 14 rebounds and also coming up big for the Patriots were senior guard Devon Goodman with 24, Evan-Eric Longino with 16 and Cole Storm with 10, including six clutch free throws in the fourth quarter to help GA keep its slim lead.

After a poor first half, in which he picked up two offensive fouls in the beginning of the second quarter that led to him getting benched for the remainder of the half and seeing his team down by four, Goodman knew his team had to turn it around if they wanted to keep their hopes of an Inter-Ac four-peat alive.

“I didn’t let that phase me. I knew that I had to change in the second half and come back with my teammates for a win,” the Penn commit said.

Coming back is just what his team did, as the Patriots (14-5, 4-1) quickly erased the four-point deficit in the third quarter, with Goodman’s 1,000th point coming on an and-one to give his team the lead permanently, 55-54 with 3:19 remaining in the third quarter.

Most kids would have let the 1,000 point honor linger over their head and affect their game, but not Goodman.

“I knew going into the game, but more importantly we wanted to get the win over Malvern,” said Goodman, who became the 22nd player to achieve the honor, according to local hoops historian Ted Silary. “And 1,000 points is just a great addition.”

Although Malvern never led for the final 11 minutes of the game, they certainly didn’t go down without a fight.

Down by four with 10 seconds left in the third, Malvern's Powers, who is also closing in on 1,000 himself, hit a step back they as time expired to cut the GA lead to one going into the fourth.

“We knew that these guys were really tough,” said Germantown Academy coach Jim Fenerty. “I don’t know how many threes they had, I know they had 10 in the first half but it seemed like they had about 50, and it seemed like they were all from half-court.”

Malvern added onto those 10 first half threes with Powers’ buzzer beater and four more in the fourth quarter to keep the Patriots on their toes.

With GA taking the lead 83-72 with under a minute left, Allison hit a three to cut the lead to six, and Devereaux followed that up with a three of his own to cut the lead to four, and Powers came up clutch again with yet another triple to cut the lead to two, but Germantown Academy kept their cool and continued to answer big shot after big shot with big shots of their own. The only difference was, they were getting their buckets from the free throw line.

After both teams entered the bonus with 6:14 remaining in the fourth quarter, and Malvern (9-8, 3-2) facing a deficit, they had no choice but to foul. The Patriots continued to answer and ended up going 18-of-23 from the free throw line in the fourth quarter.

“The difference in the game was the free-throw line,” said Harmatuck. “Great effort, but the difference was the free-throw line.”

No one was bigger from the free-throw line than Germantown Academy junior guard Cole Storm, who went 6-of-6 in the final frame to make sure his team didn’t give up their lead.

“We don’t have another point guard that is going to Penn,” said Fenerty. “But the other guys came off the bench, Cole Storm did a hell of a job for us.”

After this hard-fought win and being halfway done their Inter-Ac schedule, the Patriots have one thing on their mind.

“We knew we had to win this game to keep our hope alive and now we still have a chance for a four-peat which is our main goal,” said Goodman.