City of Basketball Love

Andrew Robinson (@ADrobinson3)
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LANSDALE — Joanie Quinn remembered being a few steps ahead of Gabby Casey, sprinting to her spot and setting her feet but not much of the rest until her teammates were picking her up, all of them yelling in her face.

Missing the middle part might have been for the best as the Cardinal O’Hara junior absorbed a mighty crash from a full-speed Casey on a one-way track with designs on tying, if not getting a chance to win, their PCL clash Thursday night. Instead, it was Quinn who won the battle - perhaps at a bit of a personal cost - drawing the decisive offensive foul with one second left and the Lions in front by two points.

It was a different sort of game-winner for Quinn, but the type of play she’d expect any of her teammates to make in the same situation, sealing up a 53-51 win and handing LC its first loss in PCL competition.

"Everybody on the court is a leader and we all want to be leaders, so we knew we had to band together," Quinn said.

Earlier this season, the junior had played hero in a more traditional and less painful way by hitting a game-winning three in double overtime against West Chester Rustin. It had to be asked, was  the shot or the charge more memorable?

“I think it was the charge,” Quinn said. “I mean, it didn’t feel great when she ran into me, but it was alright.

“It’s all about doing the little things, boxing out, going after loss balls, rebounds, jump balls, all of that is very important.”

Molly Rullo, who led O’Hara with 20 points and spent much of the game guarding the St. Joe’s-bound Casey, was in pursuit after her missed foul shot sent LC’s all-time leading scorer careening toward the rim. She was not surprised, however, that Quinn got there, got set and willingly took that hit.

“That’s a tough play and not everyone’s willing to take charges,” Rullo said. “She steps up for our team all the time like that, just a great play by her.”

Winning on the road Thursday came down to a simpler said than done plan of containing the Crusaders’ explosive offense by not turning the ball over and playing sound defense, then doing whatever else it took to get out of there with a win. Fortunately for O’Hara, that’s right in Quinn’s wheelhouse.

The guard, who drew another charge earlier in the game, found a way to have at least one impact play in every quarter. She scored the first basket of the game on a drive and layup and led the way early with 11 first quarter points capped by a three at the buzzer for a 20-15 Lions lead.

“We knew we needed to do the little things," Quinn said. "We couldn't let them score. Our defense is what we were focused on coming in. We had to be aggressive and we needed to be physical.

"Every game in the Catholic League is physical. We needed to be able to take a hit."

The game was very much physical, with plenty of whistles and plenty of spectators reacting angrily to most of them. Between the two sides, there were 19 fouls by halftime and LC went to the break with three starters having been tagged for three personals while O’Hara had a trio of players with two each and a few more with one.

Despite that, the Lions only led 31-27 due in part to their struggles at the foul line where they were just 1-of-7 over the final 2:30 of the second quarter. Outside of that, O’Hara took advantage of a Crusaders defense that seemed a step slow or a rotation short with Rullo the primary beneficiary netting 15 of her 20 on a 7-of-8 first half effort.

“As a team, we share the ball very well,” Rullo said. “Being able to move and cut into open spaces is something that really helps with that. Everyone on the floor steps up in every way possible.”

Quinn supplanted her scoring for just about everything else after the first quarter, the junior finishing with four assists, six steals, the two drawn charges and a bit of everything else. 

That was a team effort too, with Lions players left and right denying the Crusaders any clean passes inside the arc throughout the game, a tip here or a deflection there sometimes leading to steals or at the very least, a disrupted set. Being that active on the defensive helped cover for a spat of early turnovers - something Rullo said the team had to avoid to keep LC from getting its own steals and out on the run - and helped the Lions attain their goal of containing the host team’s offense.

LC coach Eric Gidney agreed, pointing to Cardinal O’Hara’s ability to switch on defense but more importantly, the way the Lions just seemed to close and disrupt every time a Crusaders player released a pass in the lane. There were clear frustrations, especially from the crowd, about some of the fouls that were going against LC but enough of their woes were self-inflicted.

"One of the things I said to the girls, whether anybody in the gym agrees or disagrees with the calls made in the game, not just at the end but all 32 minutes, we've just got to be better,” Gidney said. “We put ourselves in that position."

A patient approach and the three carried O’Hara in the third quarter. With LC cleaning up the turnovers and its defense, the Lions looked to slow the pace at points and found the right person in the right spot more often than not.

Quinn opened the quarter with a three and ended it with an assist to Greta Miller for a three of her own in the final seconds. Rullo connected on a three of her own while Carly Coleman had four of her eight points in the frame but it was Miller who was the true clutch shooter.

The junior guard had nine points, all in the second half with her first three putting O’Hara in front by 10, her second beating the quarter horn for a 12-point lead and her last - which came off a great find by Bridget Dawson - putting the Lions ahead 50-41 with 5:23 to play in the fourth.

“I trust Greta so much and I know she’s definitely, absolutely good enough to hit those shots,” Quinn said. “It was just a matter of, I saw the defense collapsing, I saw she was open and I knew she was going to hit it before I even passed it to her.”

O’Hara needed all of Miller and Coleman’s offensive output as Lansdale Catholic came roaring back over the final five minutes. A downside to a switchable defense is the occasional mismatches it can create, something LC did not take advantage of in the first half.

In the fourth quarter, it’s all the Crusaders hunted thanks to a takeover effort from sophomore Saniyah Littlejohn. One of the foul-ridden starters in the first half, Littlejohn - with help from plenty of screens by Jaida Helm to set matchups - kept attacking the rim and kept scoring.

The second-year guard had 10 of the team’s final 12 points, with the other two coming on a putback of one of her misses, as part of a 20-point effort and rallied LC to within 52-51 with 1:55 to play. A stop on the other end gave the Crusaders a chance to take the lead on an inbound with 1:23 remaining in the game.

"We ran a lot of our isolation sets for her in the fourth quarter and one thing we didn't do well tonight was exploit their switches," Gidney said. "That's really what got us in it, it wasn't the three, it was 'let's exploit mismatches,' and Saniyah is a mismatch for almost anybody so why not do that?"

Instead, Quinn jumped a pass, forcing a turnover and LC to foul. 

“I don’t know that we had that much composure, but I know we stepped up when we needed to,” Quinn said of the finish.

Following a 1-of-2 trip to the line from Quinn, LC went to Littlejohn again. The sophomore got to the rim but was not rewarded for her efforts when the look refused to fall and Rullo eventually gathered the rebound with a foul coming immediately.

Her free throw was off the mark and suddenly Casey was off and running up the floor with eyes on getting to the rim and finishing. Quinn was a little quicker, knew she got set and knew her teammates were pretty happy to see her once they got her back to her feet following the charge.

“It was a physical game, I just tried to get in position and see,” Quinn said. “She is very fast, I was already a little bit ahead of her and we’d been trying to collapse (on drives) the whole game. I don’t know, I blacked out there a little bit.”

O’Hara’s win tilted the PCL regular season table, if only slightly for the moment, leaving 8-0 Archbishop Wood now the lone unbeaten and pulling the Lions into a tie for second but ahead on the head-to-head tiebreaker. LC goes to Wood next Tuesday and finishes on the road at current No. 4 Archbishop Carroll next Thursday.

The Lions face Neumann-Goretti and West Catholic to finish, so the places at the playoff table are far from being set. All that said, neither team Thursday would be all that surprised if they pair up again in a couple weeks.

“(Coach) Chrissie (Doogan) says after every game, ‘we’re moving on,’” Rullo said. “You can celebrate it that night, but the next day, you’re moving on. That’s what our focus is, we play Penn Charter (Friday) so that’s where our focus has to be.

“Every game in the PCL is physical. That’s why you choose this league, so we have to come out and finish the regular season strong.”

By Quarter
Cardinal O’Hara:     20  |  11  |  16  |   6   ||  53
Lansdale Catholic:  15  |  12  |   8   |  16  ||  51

Scoring
CO: Molly Rullo 20, Joanie Quinn 16, Greta Miller 9, Carly Coleman 8

LC: Saniyah Littlejohn 20, Gabby Casey 16, Olivia Boccella 7, Nadia Yemola 4, Aubrey Mobley 2, Isabella Allen 2