City of Basketball Love

Jerome Taylor (@ThatGuy_Rome)
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PHILADELPHIA – Asking who the best team is in Philadelphia’s Public League this season, you’ll get a unanimous answer. But whose the second best team behind Imhotep is a more complicated question. 

On Thursday night, Amir Speights and Tymir Brown-Smalls helped Constitution make its case. 

Speights finished with 20 points, and Brown-Smalls had 17 points and 3 blocks as Constitution outlasted Sankofa Freedom in a 68-62 win to take over second place in the “A” division. 

“I told our guys how monumental it was for us to win this game,” Constitution head coach Rob Moore said. “After we beat West [Philly] and MCS [Math, Civics and Sciences], it kind of gave us a little bit of a cushion. But you know, Sankofa has been playing really well, so we're both coming into this game with one loss.” 

“It's just important when we get our seedings for playoffs, being a two or three seed, obviously you want to avoid Imhotep as long as possible. So, being safe in one of those spots is really important for us.” 

Speights' night started emphatically when the junior slammed home a buzzer-beating putback to give the Generals a 17-13 lead at the end of the first quarter. 

“That dunk, it got my energy up.” Speights said. “I wasn’t contributing scoring-wise, so I was trying to get myself and my adrenaline. I just got up to go get it.” 

After Speights’ putback, Constitution would spend the rest of the evening trying to keep their distance from Sankofa. 

Late in the second quarter, the Generals got out to an 11-point lead mainly because of  Brown-Smalls’ play. The senior scored 10 of Constitution’s 12 points in the quarter, and they needed all of them to buffer the run Sankofa would go on later. 

“I've told him he could be the best player on the court at times, but he needs to believe that and do it every single game,” Moore said about Brown-Smalls. “He can do everything. He can rebound the ball. He can shoot the ball… We can be a much better team when he starts being a little bit more aggressive.” 

Sankofa’s run started at the tail end of the first half, as Nasir Williams was able to disrupt the General’s offense on back-to-back possessions and create instant offense for his team. 

The run continued in the second half after Zaki Alston came alive after discarding the medical wrap that was around his right (shooting) hand. After he ripped the tape off midway through the third quarter, he scored 15 of his 22 points. 

But it proved insufficient because in the fourth quarter, the Generals rode some timely free throw shooting (11-15 from the line in the fourth quarter) to keep Sankofa at bay. The biggest free throws came from Speights and Kyree Latimer. 

Latimer knocked down two free throws with 1:00 to go in the fourth quarter, stretching the Generals’ lead to 59-65 after a Williams three-pointer pulled Sankofa within three points on the previous possession. 

Speights wrapped the game up, going 4-5 from the line in the fourth quarter, including hitting 1 of 2 flagrant free throws with 5 seconds remaining to secure the Generals’ fifth conference win of the year.

“We was trying to get up out of here, get second place and reach our goal to go to the Liacouras Center,” Speights said about his late-game free throw shooting. 

“He's maybe the best shooter on the team… But I've told him sometimes he relies on it too much. I get it, you wanna shoot, this is sexy out here, a 6-6 kid shooting threes,” Moore said about Speights’ game. “But these guys can't guard you. Get in there, you attack, you attack, and then it opens up things. Then you can hit these [perimeter] shots. And he put it all together tonight.”  

The Generals moved to 5-1 in league play, with their only loss coming to Imhotep. And as league play ramps up, each game becomes more critical as teams fight for division and state tournament seeding. 

In single-elimination tournaments, time can be as big an asset as your team’s performance. For example, the longer it takes to cross paths with a top-10 nationally ranked team, the higher the chance that one of those random moments happens, and Moore knows it. 

“There's teams sprinkled in everywhere. They're going to make the playoffs really competitive for the teams that are going to make it to the championship,” Moore said. “But I'm not shy about it, you want to stay out of  4, 5, 8, 9, 16, 17 [seeds]. You want to stay out of those seeds because you want to avoid Imhotep [in the public league playoffs] as long as possible.”

Next up for Constitution is Mastery North on Tuesday, and then they’ll take on Overbrook on Thursday, which can potentially be another matchup for second place in the division. 

Meanwhile, Sankofa has two non-conference games (Frankford and Bensalem) before they resume conference play against West Philadelphia, a team currently one spot below them in the standings, on Tuesday, January 24.

By Quarter
Sankofa:       13  |  13  |  13  |  23  ||  62
Constitution: 17  |  12  |  22  |  17  ||  68

Scoring
Sankofa: Nasir Williams 22,  Zaki Alston 22,  Asim Hardy 8, Khris Coleman 6,  Maurice Hosten 3, Ryan Hardy 3

Constitution: Amir Speights 20, Tymir Brown-Smalls 17, Amir Murray 12,  Kyree Latimer 8, Talasi Henderson 6, Kory Jones 3, Kervin Similien 2