City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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The 13th Annual Pete & Jameer Nelson Classic opened on Friday, with seven games taking place at the Gallagher Athletic Center’s Jefferson University (formerly Philly U).

Here are recaps of each of the seven games, updated throughout the day:

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Game One: Episcopal Academy vs. Pennsbury

After watching his Pennsbury squad fall behind by 17 points early in the second quarter at the hands of a patient Episcopal side, Falcons head coach Bill Coleman decided to force the Churchmen’s hand.

A full-court press turned out to be exactly the remedy Pennsbury needed to break out of an early-morning funk, as the Falcons came from behind to pull off a 54-45 win to begin the day.

Episcopal opened the game on a 15-0 run, and held a 23-6 advantage after scoring the first eight points of the second quarter. That’s when Pennsbury started putting pressure on the EA ballhandlers, and the tide slowly started to turn.

“We saw a few games of theirs where the pressure really got into them and sped them up and pushed them a little further out on catches,” Coleman said. “That was the key to the game.”

The Falcons narrowed the gap to eight at the midway point, and really took over in the third quarter. Senior guard Jake Martell came off the bench to score seven key points in that frame, including a 3-pointer with three minutes left to give Pennsbury its first lead, 30-29; by the time the fourth quarter came around, Pennsbury held a 36-31 lead, and never gave it up in the fourth.

After his team started out the season 1-5, Coleman was relieved to them figure out how to end up on the right side of the ledger.

“They know now that when adversity hits they can dig through it, fight their way through it, and come back,” he said. “Being down 17 to that team who can run their offense very methodically is big, so I’m proud of the guys.”

Senior guard Raylil Winton led the way for Pennsbury with 15 points, including eight in the final quarter to help the Falcons close out the win. Sophomore Collin Conner had 13, including key 3-pointers in the second and third quarters to fuel the comeback.

Alex Capitano (13 points) and Matt Dade (11) finished in double figures for Episcopal.

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Game Two: Lower Merion vs. Academy Park

Lower Merion’s Gregg Downer wasn’t happy with his team’s rebounding efforts or energy out of the gate against Academy Park, and he’s still trying to figure out his bench rotation as well.

But all things considered, the Aces’ longtime head coach couldn’t complain too much, not after Lower Merion knocked off Academy Park 59-47.

That’s the third win in a row for Lower Merion, which picked up the same number of victories to open the year before suffering a setback to league rival Conestoga on Dec. 19.

“I mean, [we’re] 6-1, we can’t get too negative here,” Downer said. “For the most part, 2017...we’re off to a good start.”

The Aces’ two star juniors led the way against Academy Park, as Jack Forrest (26 points) and Steven Payne (14) combined to score the majority of their teams’ points.

Lower Merion is missing one of its projected starters, junior guard Theo Henry, who’s still recovering from a broken bone in his foot suffered in the preseason.

So Downer has had to turn to senior guard Harrison Klevan and junior forward Josh Martin, neither of whom had a ton of varsity minutes prior to the season, as his fourth and fifth starters. Off the bench, he used juniors Matt O’Connor and Julian Hairston, as well as senior forward Isaiah Morgan. That group of five combined for 16 points against Academy Park, but that doesn’t mean Downer is done tweaking.

“I’m struggling to find players ‘5’ through ‘9’ right now,” Downer said. “My rotations are a little off, we’re just searching for the correct chemistry and we haven’t really found it yet. So that’s going to be important moving forward, to settle on some rotation.”

Academy Park (1-5) led 17-10 after one quarter, but Lower Merion woke up at that point, holding the Knights to 17 points total over the next two-plus periods, opening up a lead that was six at the half and 15 after three quarters.

Academy Park was led by 15 points from senior guard Derik Harrison, as well as an eight-point, 12-rebound effort from junior guard Naseim Harley.

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Game Three: Malvern Prep vs. Girard College

After a dismal first quarter offensively that featured as many turnovers as made field goals, Malvern Prep found its rhythm to the tune of a dominant second quarter, one that allowed the Friars to take control for good in a 69-50 win over Girard College.

In the eyes of Malvern head coach John Harmatuk, his team’s ability to turn a 3-of-18 shooting output in the first frame into an 11-of-15 clip in the second all back to unselfish play.

“The first quarter was a lot of one-on-five, five guys not guarding the ball,” he said. “When we shoot the ball and move the ball and do those things together, we’re pretty hard to guard because we have a lot of weapons on offense.”

A few of those weapons made their presence felt as the Friars (7-4) opened up the second quarter on a 16-0 run, with eight points in the first 100 seconds of play. Fueled by a pair of key triples by guard Spencer Cochran and the consistent scoring presence of sophomore point guard Deuce Turner, Malvern took a 36-27 lead into the break.

Turner led all scorers with 20 points and added seven rebounds really began to take over in the second half, using a variety of jump shots and driving finishes to help the Friars keep the Cavaliers at bay.

“(Turner’s) ability to get shots of is amazing,” Harmatuk said. “He’s scoring a lot of points making tough shots… having somebody who makes hard shots makes it a lot easier."

Capping off Malvern’s dominant four-minute stretch of basketball in the second quarter with a triple was sophomore forward Issac White, who added five points on top of a team-high ten rebounds.

“He can even score 25,” Harmatuk said. “He’s a versatile athlete, and his energy, with deflection sand rebounding and doing those kinds of things, that allows us to be more versatile defensively.”

Leading the way for Girard College (6-4) in the losing effort were 6-foot-6 sophomore forward Mikeal Jones with 13 points and 10 rebounds, and senior guard Daiquan Copeland with a team-high 16 points.

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Game Four: St. Joe’s Prep vs. Cheltenham

In a game that featured two La Salle signees, Jack Clark of Cheltenham, and Ed Croswell of St. Joe’s Prep, it was Croswell that earned bragging rights after the Hawks defeated the Panthers 68-52.

La Salle’s head coach John Giannini was in attendance for the matchup between his future players and after both Croswell’s and Clark’s performance, he’s got to like what he saw from his future Explorers.

Croswell impressed the most, posting a game-high 22 points and a game-high 21 rebounds while Clark put up 13 points, five rebounds and two assists before he fouled out of the game with 6:49 to go in the fourth quarter.

But Croswell wasn’t the only St. Joe’s Prep senior to put up a good performance, guard Kyle Thompson had 17 points and six rebounds and Darius Kinnel finished with 12 points, five assists and three rebounds.

“I think when your best players are scoring and they’re your seniors it says a lot,” Prep head coach Speedy Morris said. “I think it says a lot about both their leadership and their skill.”

After starting the season 6-0, Prep suffered its first loss at the hands of the Haverford School on December 20 and would once again be faced with a tough task in back-to-back games.

“We lost against a good Haverford School team and we knew were going to get tested today against a good Cheltenham team and we did,” Morris said. “So going into it, we knew we had to play hard and that’s what we did.”

For Cheltenham, they were led by an 18-point, five-rebound effort from senior forward Amir Lewis. Junior center Kyin Healey contributed six points, six rebounds and three blocks for the Panthers, and senior guard Ahmad Bickley had nine points, all on 3-pointers.

The win improves St. Joe’s Prep to 7-1 while the loss drops Cheltenham to 5-3 on the year.

Up next for St. Joe’s Prep is a matchup against Bishop Shanahan tomorrow at Widener in the PBP classic while Cheltenham goes up against Upper Moreland at home on January 3.

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Game Five: Coatesville vs. Chester

For the past three or four games, Coatesville head coach Chuck Moore has used his sophomore guard Jhamir Brickus a little differently.

Brickus, a 5-foot-9 guard, is a special talent, and Moore knows it. He said the Red Raiders have started to run their offense through him, somewhat like how the Houston Rockets use James Harden or the Oklahoma City Thunder use Russell Westbrook.

In Friday’s game against Chester, Brickus poured in 27 points, including eight in the fourth quarter, to help deliver Coatesville a 68-46 win.

“He’s a special kid,” Moore said. “He has all the savvy in the world that you would ask from a player. Twenty-seven for him is something he’s capable of doing every night. We kind of changed our format. We kind of put the ball in his hands a lot now.”

Coatesville jumped out from the start, taking an 11-0 lead less than five minutes into the game. Brickus scored seven of the 11. The Red Raiders held a 10-point lead after the first quarter and went into halftime up 26-19 behind 16 points from Brickus.

The Red Raiders outscored Chester by 10 in the third quarter to pull away from Chester. Eight different players scored for Coatesville in the third quarter, including senior forward Donte Crews, who had all 10 of his points in the second half.  

“When you got like eight state titles in your back pocket, they’re going to be tough every year no matter what happens,” Moore said of Chester. “I was glad the way my guys set the tone in the first three minutes when we jumped out on them early, 11-0. We kind of maintained that throughout the game.”

Senior guard Brian Randolph led Chester with 11, while junior Michael Smith added 10.

Coatesville plays Lower Merion at 6:45 PM on Saturday. Chester follows with a matchup against Penncrest at 8:30 PM.

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Game Six: Abington vs Archbishop Carroll

Archbishop Carroll head coach Paul Romanczuk knew he was going to have a tough time trying to contain Abington’s junior forward Eric Dixon.

The 6-foot-7 Dixon, who holds offers from 11 D-I schools, most notably Villanova, finished the game scoring 23 points, but it wasn’t enough as Abington lost by a final score of 70-56.

“I thought he (Dixon) had 30-35, the way he was scoring.” Romanczuk said.  “Our gameplan was is that if we could keep the ball out of his hands, which is a lot easier said than done, possession by possession, that’s how we would win.

This matchup was one of the several matchups of the day that was featured a battle between high-major D-I prospects.

Abington has Dixon and Archbishop Carroll’s high-major D-I prospect is A.J. Hoggard, who holds offers from UConn, Seton Hall and Rutgers and he played a solid game himself, earning the game’s MVP award in the process.

His final linescore with 14 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists for Carroll. Fellow teammates Justin Anderson and Keyon Butler finished with 17 points and 16 points, respectively.

Abington also had key contributions from junior forward Lucas Monroe, who scored 17 points and grabbed six rebounds. Senior guard Robbie Heath chipped in 11 points and eight rebounds for the Galloping Ghosts.

The win improves Archbishop Carroll to 5-3 on the year, while the the loss dropped Abington to 4-2.

Carroll’s next game is against Delaware powerhouse Salesianum on Saturday afternoon at 4:00 at Widener and Abington’s next opponent is Neshaminy on January 3.

“To go and to have a signature win like this and if we’re able to put another good one together tomorrow heading into the Catholic League, it would be great.” Romanczuk said.