City of Basketball Love

Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue)
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(Ed. Note: This story is part of CoBL’s “Prepping for Preps” series, which will take a look at many of the top high school programs in the region as part of our 2022-23 season preview coverage. The complete list of schools previewed thus far can be found here.)
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Conestoga girls athletic programs have established themselves perennially amongst the best in the area.

Lacrosse, soccer, field hockey and tennis are a few of the Pioneer teams typically in the running — if not the favorites — for Central League and District 1 and sometimes even state titles.

The school’s girls basketball squad is hoping it can soon be lumped into that group.

“We’re tired of all the other sports getting all the credit,” Conestoga junior forward Bella Valencia joked last month.

Valencia and her sister Katrina are part of a junior class that joined the program three seasons ago and helped push its trajectory upward.

The Valencias and classmate Marisa Francione have played hoops together since fifth grade and lead a change in the program as ‘basketball-first’ players who play the sport year round.

“When we first started we had one girl who played AAU basketball where basketball was her primary sport,” Conestoga fifth-year coach AJ Thompson said. “We had a bunch of lacrosse and soccer players, really good athletes, but it’s kind of difficult to compete against other schools who have primary basketball players. Last year was the real first year we had girls who were playing AAU and playing year round and basketball was their primary sport and had a good season because of that.”

Conestoga finished its 2022-23 campaign with a 13-9 mark, which was the first winning season under Thompson. The Pioneers finished 9-7 in the Central League for seventh place, one spot out of the league’s six-team playoffs.

It looked like the young Pioneers might be ready to compete for a league title when they started their season 10-2 and 7-1 in the Central, including wins over playoff teams Haverford and Radnor. 

Then came a six-game skid against Springfield-Delco (41-35), Harriton (30-26), Garnet Valley (61-51), Haverford (53-36) and Ridley (31-27).

“I think this year that’s something we can build on and make a run in the Central League because I think we have the talent to do it and we’re going to change our style of play a little bit because of the players we have,” Thompson said.

“We want to win a Central League championship,” Francione said. “We said that last year. We came close. In the beginning we started off really strong. I think this year we’re going to do that again.”

The Pioneers qualified for the District 1 postseason for the first time under Thompson in 2022-23 and the first time since advancing to the second round in 2017-18.

Their postseason trip was short lived as the No. 17 Pioneers dropped a 40-37 contest to No. 16 Great Valley in front of a rowdy crowd.

“The other team, it was a home game for them, so they were all fired up,” Katrina Valencia said. “We were kind of shaken up a little bit, so I think we’re going to have to get used to that.”

“It was disappointing to lose,” she added. “We made it that far and then we just lost. It makes us want to do a lot better for next season.”

Conestoga hasn’t won a District 1 playoff game since that 2017-18 campaign. The last deep tournament run the Pioneers made was a run to the District 1 quarterfinals in 2016.

They feel capable of making some noise this season after their short-lived postseason experience from a season ago.

“I think we can lean on that experience to know what playoff basketball is going to be like and what it’s going to take to get to that second round,” Thompson said. “I think it was a great experience for us. The girls battled throughout the game and we had great chances to win it and we came up a little bit short, but moving forward that’s only going to be a positive for us.”

Forward Kate Galica (10 ppg, 6 rpg, 4 spg, 2 apg), a Virginia lacrosse recruit, is the only starter not returning for the Pioneers this season as she gets healthy for her primary sport. Kate Faith is the only other rotation player who graduated from last year’s team.

Francione (5-6), Bella Valencia (5-7), Katrina Valencia (5-6), sophomore forward Janie Preston (6-1) and freshman guard Ryan Jennings (5-11) are the top candidates to start early in the preseason. Junior point guard Arielle Paige and sophomore wing/ forward Ruth Lanouette are the other top members of the rotation who have been playing throughout the fall.

The Conestoga guards, Francione in particular, are aggressive on defense. That leads to forcing turnovers and playing with pace, which should be hallmarks of this year’s team.

“I think this year, we’ve been pushing the ball down the court more, running fast, trying to get some easy points on fast breaks and stuff,” Francione said. “That’s a key part of our program.”

“Just playing aggressive on defense, getting in the passing zones and everything, doubling. We like to trap and double, pick passes off. I think our toughness shows.”

Preston is also a talented and improving young forward who can score the ball, which gives the Pioneers an added element inside.

“I think also we want to try to get it to our post (Preston) more, so she can either create moves for her in the paint or kick it out for shots,” Katrina Valencia said.

The group plays together throughout the offseason and plays a lot of basketball throughout the calendar year. There’s not just chemistry but also a lot of high IQ basketball players on the Pioneer roster that allows Thompson to do some things with this group he hasn’t been able to do in the past.

“We run a lot of Princeton style offense where it’s a lot of back cuts and it’s reading and knowing where your players are and understanding the game,” Thompson said. “We have high basketball IQ kids, so we’re able to run that stuff because I know they can read what I want them to read and look for certain spots where we want to be. It’s great.”

Thompson’s squads have improved in each season going from a 6-16 (2-14) team in 2018-19 to last season’s 13-9 squad.

Now, the plan is to take an even bigger leap … and maybe add some Central League girls basketball hardware to the Conestoga trophy case.

“We want one,” Katrina Valencia said.