City of Basketball Love

Andrew Robinson (@ADrobinson3)
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WHITEMARSH — Erin Daley had every reason to be upset.

After a strong opening quarter, the Plymouth Whitemarsh junior had picked up three fouls in the second frame that relegated her to the bench to watch a subpar finish to the first half. Knowing she would be switched off her defensive assignment in the second half, Daley could have gotten frustrated or let herself become a nonfactor when she came back on the floor.

Daley, like the rest of her Colonials teammates, is too mature for that and they used a strong second half to back up a lightning-strike start to top Abington 58-46 on Tuesday, clinching their third straight SOL Liberty title.

"Our coaches see what we need to do better and sometimes it is hard to hear what you did wrong or need to do better," Daley said. "At the same time, we know they're not doing it to hurt us or just to criticize us, it's to make us better in a game moment so we can execute better and get these kinds of wins.

"In our last film session, our assistant coach said 'this isn't supposed to just be fun, it's supposed to be a hard fun,' so when we go out there, we want to attack and yes, we want to win so that when we do win, we're coming off with smiles on our faces."

A textbook case of the Colonials' collective team maturity came less than two weeks before Tuesday's win, in their first meeting with the Ghosts. While PW left Abington's gym with a win, Daley quickly pointed out that despite what most people would have thought, the Colonials weren't happy with their performance.

They, in senior point guard Kaitlyn Flanagan's words, had been "rattled" by the Ghosts' pressure and "struggled" with the halfcourt traps and double-teams their rivals had thrown. So, they did what a mature team would do and sat down to review the game expecting to get critiqued, broken down and called out so they could do better the next time.

"A mature team knows the value of every rep in practice and every possession in a game," Colonials coach Dan Dougherty said. "A mature team knows in the second quarter, a defensive stop there is just as valuable as a defensive stop in the fourth quarter. That's the maturity of this team, they took that film session and instead of patting ourselves on the back every time we did something well or saying two positives for every one negative, they wanted to watch the film and see what we needed to get better at."

PW couldn't have asked for a better start on Tuesday. Junior Abby Sharpe, who led the Colonials with 19 points, buried a 3-pointer off a Flanagan assist nine seconds into the game. Abington turned the ball over on its first three possessions, leading to another Sharpe three, a trey from senior Jordyn Thomas and Daley knocking in two at the line for an 11-0 lead just 1:48 into regulation.

With senior Lainey Allen rounding out the first five with classmates Flanagan and Thomas and juniors Sharpe and Daley, PW has one of the most experienced starting lineups not only in the SOL but likely in District 1. Their rotation doesn't extend deep but senior Fiona Gooneratne is a captain and has been lauded by the coaches for her leadership and junior Angelina Balcer comes from a basketball family.

On top of being good players, they're also all outstanding students so if they see something being done wrong, their coaches know it's a likely chance that the issue won't continue very long. As a collective, it's a supportive and encouraging group but also one not hesitant to be self-analytical.

"We watch film and it's not about complimenting each other, it's about ‘what did we do wrong?’ and ‘what do we need to improve?’," Flanagan, a Holy Cross recruit, said. "We spend a lot of time on film, our coaches spend so much time on all of it, so we want to take advantage of it."

Most teams would have walked out of a good road win in a rival's win feeling quite good about the accomplishment. Not this Colonials team, not with the amount of mistakes they made, not with the knowledge the Ghosts hadn't played their best either and certainly not with a rematch looming less than two weeks from that night.

So on Tuesday, with a win securing the division title they set as the first of some lofty goals for this winter, the Colonials showed why they have those aspirations. When the same things that caused problems the first time around surfaced again, PW was ready for them.

"It's a big part of how mature we've all become over the years together," Daley said. "We know they're going to send trappers or not send trappers and we knew we had to be the ones ready. We had to notice when our girl left and communicate it, it was always in our minds. Even if your girl didn't leave but you saw a girl in the corner leave, we needed to communicate to that person to go get the ball and help. I think we all had that tonight."

In the 2019-20 season, the Colonials ended up playing their other main SOL Liberty rival, Upper Dublin, four times. Flanagan and Daley both noted they could possibly exceed that against Abington with possible SOL tournament, District 1 playoff and PIAA tournament meetings in the next month-and-a-half but they'd welcome that challenge.

"Every single player on our team wants it so much," Daley said. "We all love the game. We all love being together and we're all well aware the longer we keep winning, the longer we keep going and the longer we get to be together."

The Colonials are mature enough to know nothing is given from here out, but it's a maturity gained from having gone through the highs and heartbreaks of the postseason in years past.

"We've been there before and know what it takes, but we're definitely hungry," Flanagan said. "With success, it's great to be three-time league champs and we'll celebrate tonight but tomorrow, it's on to the next. We always have that mentality, we want to do it for our teammates who are still going to be here, we want to do it for each other, for our coaches, for everyone who's helped us along the way."

By Quarter
Plymouth Whitemarsh:  26  |   8   |  11  |  13  ||  58
Abington High School:  11  |   9   |   9   |  17  ||  46

Scorers
PW: Abby Sharpe 19, Erin Daley 13, Jordyn Thomas 13, Lainey Allen 8, Kaitlyn Flanagan 5

A: Cire Worley 20, Abril Bowser 13, Jaida Helm 9, Maya Johnson 2, Piper McGinley 2