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Lower Merion boys hold off Radnor in battle atop Central League

01/21/2022, 11:45pm EST
By Josh Verlin

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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RADNOR — Sam Wright didn’t think twice.

The Lower Merion junior raced ahead of the press break, got to his spot in the corner, Justin Poles delivering the pass right to his waiting hands. Time and situation — holding a six-point lead at Radnor with three minutes left, every possession vital in a rivalry battle at the top of the Central League — melted away. 


Sam Wright (above) had 15 points as Lower Merion beat Radnor on Friday night. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

All Wright saw was the rim, and all he thought was ‘shoot it.’

“I was open, catch and shoot, it felt really good,” he said. “I knew it was going to go down.”

“We call it The Dagger,” LM coach Gregg Downer said with a laugh. “There’s a little bit of risk-reward with that, but we’re confident and he’s a really good shooter. He’s got the green light most of the time.”

Wright’s shot, his biggest in a 15-point outing, helped the Aces close strong in front of a packed house, holding off the Raptors in a 60-48 win.

Lower Merion and Radnor have been archrivals for decades, geographic proximity and a similar demographic makeup turning the two Main Line public high schools into on-court and on-field foes in just about every sport. But they haven’t often been equals on the hardwood, at least on the boys’ side: Gregg Downer, who’s been the Aces’ boss since the early 1990s, couldn’t remember the last time his squad lost to Radnor.

Radnor’s gym was a perfect display of that rivalry on Friday night, a massive Raiders student section at one end and an equally large Aces on at the opposite corner, the first game this season Radnor let fans pack the stands. The two factions were at odds from pre-game, when a PA snafu led to each singing the National Anthem — starting at different times and singing at different speeds, neither content to give in to the other side.

“I knew it was going to be a good environment,” Downer said. “We told the kids before the game, you’ve been waiting two years to play in an environment like this.”

“Their crowd and stuff, you can’t let them get in your head,” Poles said. “You just have to play your game.”

The Aces did that for large stretches, overcoming an early five-point deficit with a 20-7 second quarter to go up 27-16 at half. 

Without star junior Sam Brown (ankle), who got hurt last weekend in LM’s eye-opening win over Reading and is expected to miss another week or two, and with Penn State-bound big man Demetrius Lilley (9 points, 8 rebounds) in early foul trouble and not at his best all evening, Lower Merion (12-2, 9-1) relied on its role players to step up in the scoring column. 

Wright, a 6-3 guard who flashed his scoring potential in the offseason, was 6-of-9 from the floor and 3-of-5 from downtown to lead all scorers. Poles, a 6-1 guard, was also 6-of-9 but got his buckets at the rim, including a tough and-one in the second quarter; he also added six rebounds and four assists. 

“We needed our role players to step up today, and if that didn’t happen, we weren’t going to win,” Wright said. “We brought a lot of energy, our role players played great. And if that didn’t happen, I don’t think we had a chance today.”

“Often, I think basketball teams are defined by players 3-through-8,” Downer said. “A lot of times, ballclubs have two good players and [...] it’s what the other players do.”

Poles and Wright weren’t the only two who stepped up. Senior guard Jaylen Shippen had five points, four rebounds and five assists; senior forward Henry Bard had five points and three rebounds; junior guard Teddy Pendergrass III provided some key defense and a three-point play in the first half. 

Peter Gribbin (above) scored all 10 of his points during the second quarter. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

Senior forward Peter Gribbin, who went for a career-best 19 points in Wednesday night’s win over Penncrest, scored all 10 of his points in the second quarter, including two 3-pointers during the stretch that initially created space between the teams. 

His only assist of the night was also a key one, to Lilley for a layup during the Aces’ strong close. For a role player who’s been seeing minutes since his freshman year but has never been a featured player, Gribbin’s contributions are the result of all that experience paying off.

“He played very well tonight,” Downer said, “he’s been working and waiting a long time for that.”

In between Lower Merion’s strong second and fourth quarters, Radnor had its time in the third. 

Down as many as 15 points early in the second half, the Raptors (13-1, 8-1) used a massive push to get within 39-36 when Danny Rosenblum found Pierce Justice (team-high 12 points) for a corner 3-pointer, creating a major wave of momentum from one corner to another heading into the fourth. 

Lower Merion held junior Jackson Hicke, Radnor’s typical leading scorer, scoreless in the first half but the 6-5 wing had his hand in the big run, a 3-pointer and soaring layup getting the lead down into single digits a couple minutes earlier. By the time Hicke scored again, a 3-pointer in the final minute, the game was in LM’s hands.

“When you get down, you play with house money a little bit and we did that,” Radnor coach Jamie Chadwin said. “We got back to playing loose, the way we started the game.

“[Overall] we didn’t love our shot selection as far as we weren’t sure about some of those shots,” Chadwin added; the Raptors shot 19-of-50 (38%) overall and 5-of-17 from deep, “and I think we also may have been begging a little bit to try and draw a foul, so we were a little bit tentative.”

Despite taking its first loss of the season, Radnor is still all but assured a spot in the six-team Central League playoffs, the only other opportunity it’ll have to get revenge. They’ll go their separate ways for district and possible state appearances; Lower Merion in 6A, Radnor in 5A.

Both have six games left in the regular season until that point. LM has two against fellow 6A and one-loss Central squad Haverford High, as well as a rematch with Conestoga, its only loss. Radnor gets an easier road, without a team with a winning Central record left on the schedule as it still aims for a regular-season Central title. 

“Maybe we’ll be lucky enough to see them again, down the line,” Chadwin said. “We’d love that opportunity, if it came, because it means that we’re probably matched up in a very meaningful game. 

“But we have to earn that, and I think our guys are ready to try and do that.”

By Quarter
Lower Merion:   7   |  20  |  12  |  21  ||  60
Radnor:             9   |   7   |  20  |  12  ||  48

Shooting
Lower Merion: 24-44 FG (6-12 3PT), 6-9 FT
Radnor: 19-50 FG (5-17 3PT), 5-7 FT

Scoring
Lower Merion: Sam Wright 15, Justin Poles 13, Peter Gribbin 10, Demetrius Lilley 9, Jaylen Shippen 5, Henry Bard 5, Teddy Pendergrass III

Radnor: Pierce Justice 12, Jackson Hicke 9, Cooper Mueller 8, Charlie Thornton 8, Michael Savadove 7, Danny Rosenblum 4


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