City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Will Higson has gotten plenty used to playing with John Seidman over the years.

The two Haverford High School juniors go back before their freshman year on the Fords’ team, to their middle school days as seventh graders. That’s given Higson plenty of time to get to know Seidman, but also understand his game –– which is why the Fords’ 6-foot-2, 215-pound forward knows exactly what to do whenever Seidman starts to drive to the hoop.

“When I see him drive...I’ve seen that it’s tough to stop him when he gets a head of steam,” Higson said. “So the guy that’s guarding me usually has to come up and help, and I just know I’m going to be open after that.”

And Seidman knows it, too.

“I’ve been playing with (Will) for a while, I always trust him to catch it and he’s obviously good at finishing it, he doesn’t miss many,” he said. “And he makes his foul shots, that’s nice to have.”

There’s no doubt that Seidman and the rest of the Fords have figured out exactly how to utilize Higson, finding the junior big man over and over again against Ridley in a crucial Central League affair on Tuesday night. More than a few times, Seidman would dribble past one defender, hop-step around another, and then –– right as the help defender stepped forward to stop the Fords’ leading scorer from getting to the hoop –– he’d drop it off to a waiting Higson, who had no issue popping the ball up-and-in.

By the end of the evening, Higson had a career-high 19 points, and the Fords had themselves a 61-43 win.

That continues a remarkable turnaround for Haverford (12-9, 8-7), which was just 2-7 in league play after a 54-51 loss to Harriton on Jan. 14, their shot at making either the Central League or District 1 6A playoffs looking less and less likely on the tail end of a six-game losing streak. But despite the rough times after a 4-0 (2-0) start to the season, the Fords found their momentum, starting with a win over Springfield (Delco.) on Jan. 16. 

Seidman got them really going six days after that, hitting a game-winning 3-pointer to beat Strath Haven. Then came a 12-point road win at Lower Merion, a two-point win at Conestoga thanks to a buzzer-beating put-back by senior Sean Reynolds, and another Seidman buzzer-beater for a one-point win at Upper Darby last Friday.

“It hurt to lose by buzzer-beaters, triple overtimes, crazy shots that went in,” Higson said. “But we stuck together, and that’s the reason why we’re going on a streak.

“I think we’re playing a little more loose now. After those losses...it was tough to come back from those, but now that we’ve gotten some wins under our belt, we’re starting to roll, starting to play loose.”

“It’s all on the kids, they didn’t give up,” Heinrichs said. “When we lost those games, they were picking me up, I was the one walking around miserable, and they were picking me up. These guys are great, a great group of kids to be around.”

By beating Ridley (11-10, 7-8) in a matchup of two of the three teams that entered play Tuesday night tied for fifth in the league –– the other, Radnor, escaped Marple by two points –– Haverford kept control of its destiny in the Central League playoff picture, tied with Radnor for the fifth and six spots in the newly-expanded six-team playoffs.

Had the Fords lost, they would have had a tough time making the league playoffs, with a trip to league leader Garnet Valley (20-1, 14-1) closing out the regular season on Thursday. 

“We knew that this was kind of a play-in game, I said ‘you wanted to make the Central League playoffs, well this is kind of like your playoff here tonight,’” Heinrichs said. “And they responded well.”

Haverford junior John Seidman (above) had 10 points, eight assists, and four rebounds in the Fords' win over Ridley. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)
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If Haverford can’t get past GV, it’ll have to hope that Ridley (the only eight-loss team in the league) also loses on the road, to Lower Merion (16-5, 11-4), or it’ll go into tiebreakers. Ridley and Haverford split their two regular-season meetings.

No matter what happens for Haverford in the Central League playoffs, the Fords are safely in the District 1 6A field, seeded No. 13 in the unofficial district rankings after Friday night’s results. That would put them in line for a home game in the first round, though things always shift around when the rankings become official at the district meeting Sunday morning.

But if the Fords are going to play like they did Tuesday, they’ll give themselves a real chance at not only making the Central League playoffs but winning a few games there and in districts.

Higson, who’s more known for his abilities as a linebacker on Haverford’s football team, was 8-for-9 from the floor and hit all three of his foul shots as he led all players in scoring –– and grabbed eight rebounds for good measure –– in a night the Fords were pretty darn efficient on the offensive end. 

Haverford went 22-of-35 (.628) from the floor, including 6-of-12 (.500) from 3-point range, dishing out 17 assists on 22 baskets. All nine players who saw action before the game's final couple minutes either scored a bucket or dished out an assist.

They got it going early against the Green Raiders; a 10-6 lead after one quarter became 30-13 at the break, with Seidman finding Higson inside over and over and sophomore Nick Colucci (14 points) hitting a pair of second-quarter triples.

“I think everything was just starting to click, we’ve been on a roll,” Higson said. “We got out to an early lead and we didn’t really look back.”

By Quarter
Haverford:  10 |  20  |  15  |  16  |  61

Ridley:         6  |   7   |  14  |  16  |  43

Shooting
Haverford: 22-35 FG, 6-12 3PT, 11-14 FT

Ridley: 17-43 FG, 7-18 3PT, 2-4 FT

Scoring
Haverford: Higson 19, Colucci 14, Seidman 10, Krazia 7, Reynolds 6, Seidman 3, Dwight 2

Ridley: Henson 11, Williams 10, Grace 6, Marro 6, Bishop 3, Howard 3, Esrey 2, Hagan 2