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West Catholic’s next train ride begins after the Burrs’ 79-46 demolition of Father Judge

01/13/2023, 11:30pm EST
By Joseph Santoliquito

Joseph Santoliquito (@JSantoliquito)

PHILADELPHIA — West Catholic head coach Miguel Bocachica owes his team a train ride. It’s a promise he made to the Burrs a few years back that once they reached the fabled Palestra in the Catholic League playoffs, they would get the Market–Frankford Line, or by more local parlance, “The El,” to get there.

That’s exactly what the Burrs did last February—took The El to the game on a brisk Thursday evening.

There was no train ride home. West Catholic was upset by Archbishop Ryan in the semifinals, and with it, a promising season soon withered and eventually deflated with all the team’s emotional investment wrapped up in that game.


Budd Clark (left) and Zion Stanford combined for 50 points as West Catholic ran away from Father Judge. (Photo: Joseph Sanotliquito/CoBL)

This season, minus some key wheels in graduating Nasir Griffin (East Stroudsburg) and Kaseem and Kareem Watson (CSU-Bakersfield), there seems to be a different vitality about the Burrs.

It was a team that was just happy to reach the Catholic League semifinals and play in the Palestra last year. The 2022-23 Burrs have plans on finishing what their predecessors didn’t complete.

On Friday night, in West Catholic’s historic bandbox gym, the Burrs ripped through promising Father Judge, 79-46, with Temple-bound Zion Stanford (27 points) and Coppin State-bound Adam Clark (23) combining for 50 of the Burrs’ 79.

It was a game for 12 minutes. Clark did not start, for what he said were “personal reasons,” though once he was injected into the lineup, the Burrs rolled going on a 16-3 second-quarter run and were never threatened again.

The blue banner outlined in yellow still has a lot of space under 1959—the last time West Catholic (7-6 overall, 3-1 Catholic League) won the Catholic League championship in boys’ basketball.

The Burrs can’t miss it. They look at it every day. They thought they had to team last year to break that long streak. They didn’t.

“Last year, our mission was pretty much to make it to the Palestra, because that was a big milestone, and that’s where we went wrong,” Stanford said. “We were just happy to be there. Our goal was to make it. We’ve been there, and this year, we’re going for it all and we’re able to do it.

“This is like the revenge tour. It hurt all of us losing in the Catholic League, districts and the states (to Catholic League rival and eventual 3A state champ Devon Prep in the state quarters). My goal this year is to lead. Last year, I was under the seniors. I remember seeing everyone hurt last year when we lost, and I don’t want to go through that again.”


The banner in West Catholic's gym hasn't been updated since the 1950s. (Photo: Joseph Santoliquito/CoBL)

Neither does anyone wearing blue and white.

“Everyone in our league knows we’re not laying down and it’s great that we’re relevant again, we need to get punched in the face more than once,” Bocachica said. “When we lost to Ryan in the Catholic semifinals, that ended everything. You could feel it. We were trying to prepare at practice and it was draining. The loss to Ryan at the Palestra, that ended it.”

“I knew I had to impact the game when I got in tonight,” said Clark, who scored all 23 of his points in three quarters. “We were down by six and knew we had to rebound more, and get out in transition more. We have dog in us this year. We’re different dogs. Me and Zion have different roles and I would say our demeanor is no team in this league could beat us. Beating Judge was a big win for us.  

“Everyone around us can shoot. We can spread it. I can speak for myself, I wasn’t confident in my shot last year. We’re not going away. The banner stops at 1959. We’re trying to change that.”   

Bocachica reminds his team that the Palestra is still in their backyard. He plans on doing the same thing the team did last February.

“We got on the El and we walked to the Palestra last year and we always talked about going to the Palestra, going to the Palestra, going to the Palestra,” Bocachica said. “We didn’t talk enough about our team’s job and what we had to do once we got there. We laid an egg, or whatever you want to call it. We prepared for Ryan, but it (was) always about getting to the Palestra, and now the talk is we want to go back.

“We’re going to do it again. I thought it was a great experience. I owe my team a train ride. We’re getting on the EL again. The Palestra is in our backyard. We don’t need a bus.”

By Quarter

Father Judge (6-5, 2-2 Catholic League):  17   | 4  |  13  |  12 ||  46

West Catholic (7-6, 3-1):  11  | 23  |  22  | 23 ||  79

Scoring
Father Judge: Laquan Byrd 13, Kyle Jones 9, Ernest Shelton 5, Kuwair Kennedy 4, Rocco Westfield 3, Kevin Beck 3, Mike McCusker 3, Derrick Morton-Rivera 2, Chris Brennan 2, Mike Browning 2.

West Catholic: Zion Stanford 27, Adam Clark 23, Amyr Walker 11, Tariq Jennings 5, Marcus Branker 4, Jaden Banner 3, Mike Singleton 2, Isaiah Muhammad 2, Charles Cook 2.

Joseph Santoliquito is an award-winning sportswriter based in the Philadelphia area who began writing for CoBL in 2021 and is the president of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be followed on Twitter here.


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