City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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BRYN MAWR — Charlie Thornton almost made one massive mistake on Monday night.

As the Radnor senior climbed down from the ladder in the Harriton High School gymnasium, net in hand, he spotted a familiar face waiting at the bottom: Calvin Hicke, the 6-year-old brother of teammate Jackson Hicke, hand outstretched, yelling his name. So Thornton did the selfless thing, handing the net over like it was nothing.

Immediately, all of Thornton’s Radnor teammates started yelling at him — and Thornton, realizing what he’d done, quickly got the net back. 

Thornton and Radnor can be forgiven if they didn’t know exactly what to do after a net-cutting ceremony. After all, it had been a long, long, long time since the Raptors had gotten the chance — at least 50 years, as far as anyone can tell.

“Definitely the inexperience of a net-cutting, I saw Jackson’s little brother and I couldn’t help but give it to him,” Thornton said, “and then I was like ‘oh, I need it back.'

“That was definitely a mistake on my part.”

It might have been his only one. 

Thornton was absolutely stellar in a 60-47 win over Lower Merion, a victory that earned Radnor the right to call itself champions for the first time in decades, the Central League title finally in the Raptors’ hands after they fell short to the Aces in the title game a year ago.

The 6-foot-4 wing guard led all scorers with 26 points, missing the first and last shot he took but hitting all eight in the middle, going 6-of-7 from deep and 4-of-4 from the foul line, every shot he made bigger than the last in the most meaningful win of his and his teammates’ lives.

For his effort — which included four rebounds and two fourth-quarter blocks, one that was maybe the biggest defensive play of the game — he was awarded Central League Tournament MVP, and rightfully so. He immediately gave credit to the rest of the Radnor rotation: Hicke, Danny Rosenblum, Cooper Mueller, Henry Pierce, Michael Savadove and more.

“I really can’t thank Danny and Cooper and Jackson and Sav, Henry, everyone that rotates in, just to have confidence in me,” he said of a night where most of his shots were of the catch-and-fire variety, his teammates all finding him in space, firing away in rhythm time and again, each one of them finding the bottom of the net. “It felt bigger than life, honestly, having my friends in the student section, my parents watching us out there do something that has never been done before, it was awesome.”

“He did everything, I love him, he’s my boy and I’m just so happy to see it because you don’t see how hard he’s worked,” Hicke said. “When we were in fifth grade [...] you would let him shoot 3s and be happy with it, he was the worst shooter in Radnor Township. Now he’s the best shooter in Radnor Township.

“It’s unbelievable to see how hard he’s worked, how it paid off on the biggest stage, it just came through [...] every coach on the East Coast should be calling him after that game. He proved that he could do everything on the court and he’s really barely scratching the surface. The sky’s the limit. He was the MVP, it was unbelievable, I was so happy.”

Monday night’s win was the latest step for a Radnor squad which had been steadily improving over the last couple years behind the core of 2023 graduates, who by the end of their sophomore season were showing real signs they were going to be a problem to be reckoned with in the Central League.

They’ve not only done that, they’ve become one of the best teams in the entire Philadelphia area, still unbeaten on the season at 24-0, the clear District 1 5A favorites — they’ll face either Sun Valley or Marple Newtown in the quarterfinals next Wednesday — and a threat to make a deep run in the PIAA Class 5A tournament. 

“It’s pretty remarkable to have a group come together, stay together, and beat a program that’s been the standard in the Central League,” Radnor coach Jamie Chadwin said. “We set four goals in the beginning of the year and we’ve accomplished two of them [the regular-season and Central League championships], nowhere in there was an undefeated regular season part of that. 

“So it’s nice to be able to get those two and then certainly carry the momentum hopefully into districts and then see where it goes.”

Hicke, the Princeton-bound wing, scored all 19 of his points in the final three quarters, getting most of that in the second and third frames. Rosenblum, committed to D-III Rochester (N.Y.), had six points but much more importantly eight assists while having few problems with the Aces’ defense. Mueller, who only took two shots and finished with two points, grabbed five rebounds and dished out five dimes. 

All of them — plus Pierce, Savadove and Jackson Gaffney, the last piece of their top seven, who see the vast majority of the minutes for the Raptors — played stellar defense on Lower Merion, making Penn-bound guard Sam Brown (15 points) really work for his shots; Jordan Meekins added 14, doing most of his damage in the first half, and Sam Wright 10 for the Aces. 

Offensively, all Radnor did was shoot 20-of-30 for the game, including 8-of-13 from 3-point range. In the second half, they were 12-of-14 from the floor and 4-of-6 from downtown, the ball moving constantly, the Raptors seemingly not needing to look on half of their passes, just knowing where each other was on the court.

“I think it’s just getting a rhythm to the game,” Chadwin said. “These guys have such a great feel for each other that when we play, I’m not calling much, we’re letting them play on instinct, we trust them, they’re seniors and juniors who have come up playing together and they don’t need a coach to stand in their way to try to make plays. I think what we try to do is not over-coach them and just try to keep encouraging them to make the next right play right.”

Lower Merion (20-4) got the best of Radnor in last year’s championship, but Radnor’s seniors showed that this year would be different with a 64-41 win last month. That one also featured a big third quarter (21-5); Monday’s was 20-7, not quite as big, but equally as effective, taking what had been a tie game at halftime and turning it into a 43-30 lead going into the fourth.

Thornton started the second half off for Radnor with an alley-oop dunk, then followed with his fourth triple of the evening, forcing a Lower Merion timeout. Lower Merion cut it back to four, but Rosenblum hit a triple and Thornton a layup before Hicke capped off the scoring that quarter with a bucket in the lane. 

“I think we just ramp up our defense,” Rosenblum said. “In the first half, we’re a little hesitant with the fouls, trying not to pick stuff up, but in the third quarter we just ramp up the pressure and our offense drives from our defense.”

Lower Merion hung around the whole fourth quarter, but they couldn’t stop Thornton. He hit back-to-back triples around those by Meekins and Wright to keep the lead at seven, then came up with an incredible block from behind on a layup attempt, preventing Lower Merion from cutting it to a five-point game and giving the large Aces contingent reason to get loud.

Instead, Rosenblum found a cutting Gaffney for a layup to re-establish a nine-point lead with 2:18 left, and it became a matter of just making foul shots — which the Raptors did, going 9-of-10 from the line in the fourth quarter.

Radnor finally got to start celebrating with under 30 seconds to play, the group of seniors who’ve been playing together since their middle school years and earlier realizing that one of the major goals they’ve been focused on for the last seven years was finally coming true.

“It feels amazing,” Rosenblum said. “I mean, all the years we’ve been playing together, all the stuff we’ve been through, to finally see it pay off, it’s just an unreal feeling.”

“We really did it after all these years of hard work, staying together,” Hicke said. “It’s just a feeling that is indescribable and it’s what we worked towards this whole time. I’m at a loss for words, honestly. It’s amazing.”

It was clear that Radnor hadn’t won a title in a while when the team wasn’t quite sure what to do when cutting down the net, none of the players posing for photographs at the top (and a few struggling with the scissors) before Thornton’s giveaway. 

Considering the way they’ve adapted to everything else thrown at them this season, you can be sure they’ll figure it out if given another chance.

 “Hopefully,” Chadwin said with a smile, “this is something we can learn from for future times.”

By Quarter
Radnor:            14  |   9   |  20  |  17  ||  60
Lower Merion:  19  |   4   |   7   |  17  ||  47

Shooting
Radnor: 20-30 FG (8-13 3PT), 12-17 FT
Lower Merion: 17-35 FG (6-15 3PT), 6-8 FT

Scoring
Radnor: Charlie Thornton 26, Jackson Hicke 19, Danny Rosenblum 6, Jackson Gaffney 4, Michael Savadove 2, Cooper Mueller 2, Henry Pierce 1

Lower Merion: Sam Brown 15, Jordan Meekins 14, Sam Wright 10, Justin Poles 2, John Mobley 2, Teddy Pendergrass III 2