City of Basketball Love

Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3)
—

PHILADELPHIA — From head-to-toe, Kaitlyn Flanagan was in complete control.

With time winding down in the first half of Saturday’s District 1 6A girls’ basketball title game, the Plymouth Whitemarsh senior point guard drove into the lane, drew two defenders into collapsing on her and somehow keeping her left toes on the ground, faked a shot and found Abby Sharpe open to her right.

In one motion, Sharpe caught and shot the ball, giving a clap as she hopped back toward the Colonials bench as the halftime horn sounded.

PW had come to Temple’s Liacouras Center to finish a job and they weren’t leaving anything to chance. The undefeated and top-seeded Colonials got their long-sought district title and a little payback by besting No. 11 Spring-Ford 49-31 on Broad Street behind another sterling defensive effort.

“Personally, I think I was in my head a little too much in the first quarter but my teammates told me to gather myself and remember it’s just a game and it’s just basketball,” Sharpe, who led PW with 16 points, said. “This team, with our communication, we’re so close and so I think that really got all those nerves away and by the second quarter, we were playing how we normally play and it led on from there.”

Sharpe’s near-buzzer-beater came at the tail end of an 11-0 Colonials run to end the first half with the last nine coming from the junior guard. Pinning the win solely on Sharpe, or on Flanagan or any of the other five PW players who saw the floor, wouldn’t be fair or correct.

All seven have played a role this season and while that role may change game to game, it’s all been for the collective goal of winning a district title. Sure, there was extra motivation because it was Spring-Ford on the other side and Erin Daley didn’t hide that fact either, but the junior forward came back to the same result any of her teammates would have when asked why the drive to win didn’t consume the team.

“We’re family,” Daley said. “We have each other’s backs. We’re out there together and that’s the most important thing for us.”

This Spring-Ford team isn’t the one that ended PW’s season in the district final a season ago, a loss that crushed the Colonials and started the fire that became the forge for this campaign’s success, but the Rams more than earned their spot at Temple. In a lot of ways, it was the fitting final challenge in the district championship hunt, another crack at the offense that had dashed the Colonials’ hopes in 2021.

PW was ready for it.

“Our kids have so much length and it was an absolute must today, the plan was ‘you must close out to the point where these kids can’t shoot,’ we wanted to push them out where they don’t feel comfortable to shoot, then they’re trying to beat you off the dribble,” Colonials coach Dan Dougherty said. “We’ve worked on it all season long. Every day, 30 minutes, man defense and don’t get beat off the dribble.”

Plymouth Whitemarsh shows off their new hardware after winning the 2022 District 1 Class 6A championship over Spring-Ford. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

Dougherty was very complimentary of Spring-Ford’s fundamental play on offense but also the way the Rams can set up mismatches with their ball movement, often getting those man-to-man drives for a finish or  kick to a shooter. Preventing those drives was the challenge for PW, especially forwards Jordyn Thomas and Lainey Allen, who knew they’d be the ones Spring-Ford tried to switch up against.

“This whole season, we’ve prepared ourselves to win this game against anyone,” Allen said. “Because it was Spring-Ford, we were hyped. We had the energy, we were ready to go. We prepared, we worked hard for this and we got it done.”

For a half, Spring-Ford’s offense struggled and even as the Rams battled back in the third quarter, they were still subsisting on a diet of very difficult shots.

“They made it a little more difficult for us to get North-South,” Rams coach Mickey McDaniel said “They forced us more East-West and took us away from attacking the rim and that’s a credit to them and what they are, which is an experience-laden team.”

PW’s second quarter run helped break the game open thanks to Sharpe exploiting the space in the midrange. The junior, who had a slow start with a couple turnovers on offense, stayed poised and got her first score on a drive with 5:32 left in the second.

After Flanagan hit from the midrange midway through the frame to push PW’s lead to 15-9 after Spring-Ford had whittled it down to four, it was Sharpe’s show. While she chalked it up to good screens from her post players and reps in practice, she still had to hit the looks.

A pair of midrange shots extended the run Flanagan had started before Sharpe drew a foul with a minute left, knocking down both free throws and finally ending the run with the no-hesitation three just before the horn.

“That’s part of the reason a lot of college coaches would love to have her on their team,” Dougherty said. “That three she hits is such an emotional lift going into the second half. I called a timeout right before she shot two free throws, I thought it was a point to catch our breath, she comes out of it and hits both free throws that allows us to get into a press, she was absolutely special in that second quarter.”

Sharpe’s streak helped PW to a 24-9 lead at the half. It was all the room they needed for their point guard to put on a clinic in the second half.

Flanagan looked for herself early, scoring six of her 11 in the first half and her teammates late, chalking up five of her eight assists after halftime. Coupled with her usual robust defense, it was another standout effort from the Holy Cross-bound senior.

“We can enjoy this but also start thinking ahead,” Flanagan said. “We have a goal of winning another championship and we know we can do it, so we’re definitely all bought-in.”

Spring-Ford closed within 31-17 in the third quarter but PW responded with two scores to end the frame. From there, as Daley put it, the Colonials just had to defend the Rams and the clock to get to the final buzzer.

All season, the Colonials have kept the end goal in mind and didn’t want to over-celebrate any step along the way. Saturday, they were going to enjoy it.

“Putting in four years of work to get here, it feels worth it,” Thomas said.

By Quarter
PW:  11  |  13  |  11  |  14  ||  49
SF:    4   |   5   |   8   |  14  ||  31

Scorers
PW: Abby Sharpe 16, Lainey Allen 12, Kaitlyn Flanagan 11, Jordyn Thomas 6, Erin Daley 4

SF: Anna Azzara 13, Aaliyah Solliday 10, Katie Tiffan 4, Mac Pettinelli 4