City of Basketball Love

Michael Bullock (@thebullp_n)
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CHESTER — Apparently, one setback this week was one too many for Jamar Sudan and his determined Chester Clippers teammates to digest.

So, imagine how dropping two games in two days may have felt.

Especially in your hometown.

As it turned out, Sudan & Co. never found out since they used some typically nasty Chester pressure and plenty of contributions from up and down the bench to turn back a determined Pennsbury side 56-48 in Game 5 of the Pete and Jameer Nelson Classic Friday night at Widener University’s Schwartz Center.

Sudan wound up pocketing 18 points, Jordan Camper chimed in with 14 and Michael Smith tacked on 10 — including four clutch freebies in crunch time — as Larry Yarbray’s Clippers (5-2) rebounded from their 53-50 loss to Abington one night earlier.

Mark Flagg collected a double-double for Pennsbury (5-3), banking 20 points and grabbing 14 rebounds before fouling out late. Bill Coleman’s feisty Falcons also picked up 16 points from diminutive senior guard Addison Howard.

And with the quick-starting Flagg-Howard combo sharing 16 early points, Coleman’s Falcons were getting what they wanted — including an 18-6 lead some six minutes in.

Enter Chester’s disruptive trapping pressure.

Not only were Yarbray’s Clippers hoping to fluster the Falcons, but they also wanted to push the pace and play much, much faster — especially since the 6-6 Sudan and 6-8 Camper can run the floor as well as Chester’s backcourt players.

“Just as good,” Yarbray admitted. “And we’ve got to take advantage of that.”

Although Coleman had no problem with the quicker tempo, he had cautioned his players about the pressure defense they figured to see yet still seemed to get caught off guard when the Clippers finally tightened their awakening vise.

“It’s Chester,” Coleman said. “We’ve been telling them, pretty much from the beginning of the year, this is what’s gonna happen in this game.

“For the better part of the last two weeks, we’ve been preparing for the half-court trap, just knowing that it’s coming. I think they didn’t realize how intense it can be.”

“First half, they hopped on us and they came out to a fast start,” Sudan said. “Us being from Chester, the tradition as our coach tells us over and over, pressure is basically the way we live. So we just overcame that and maintained that the rest of the game.”

“Sometimes we’re out there going through the motions and we ain’t warm and we ain’t running around,” Yarbray added. “We gotta be running around and we gotta be trapping and we gotta be pressing. Then we’re not thinking as much and just playing.”

What followed was a 10-0 burst capped by Sudan’s trey late in the opening quarter that had Yarbray’s bunch within two points (18-16).

Sudan’s defensive work on Flagg the last three quarters — the 6-8 senior netted 14 of his 20 in the opening nine minutes — was another critical component.

“I knew he was a good shooter, a good perimeter shooter,” Sudan said. “So I tried to sit on his right hand and make him drive to the basket.”

Able to push in front during the second quarter and grab a 28-24 halftime lead, a 7-0 spurt in the third quarter fueled by Camper’s jam, Sudan’s finish at the rim, a deep trey from Brian Randolph III and another Sudan score, Chester was up 41-28 midway through the third and on the verge of sending Coleman’s Falcons packing.

Never happened.

Still down 10 (45-35) with 6:32 to play following another Camper flush, the Bucks County Falcons were suddenly within one point (45-44) at the 2:55 mark once the 5-9 Howard knocked down the second of his three 3-balls.

“We’ve been looking for five people that will fight and scrap all year long,” Coleman said. “And that five got us back into it. They didn’t stop, they were relentless.”

While missed freebies hindered both sides — Chester was 1-for-5 from the line over the next 90 seconds, matching Coleman’s Falcons — Smith eventually canned four in a row, Sudan drained a pair and Randolph sank two as the Clippers opened things up.

“Making foul shots is part of being a point guard,” Yarbray said of Smith.

Down 56-45 with only a few seconds to play, Pennsbury was done even though Howard knocked down another trey to close things out.

“It was huge,” Coleman said of Howard complementing Flagg’s typical production. “Again, we were looking for somebody and Addie stepped up.”

Conversely, lots of guys stepped up when Chester needed them. As a result, there would be no two-game skid for the Clippers.

“This was a rebound game since we took an L the other day,” Sudan said. “Today is a new day. So we’re just gonna take this win here and get ready for the next one.”