City of Basketball Love

Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue)
__

ROSEMONT — Though the 7-15 record his team brought into the postseason wasn't by design, the schedule Bishop Shanahan coach John Dougherty put together that led to the rough results this season was.

Beginning with District 6-6A champion State College and District 1-6A No. 1 seed Spring-Ford in its first two games this season, Dougerty’s squad navigated a regular-season schedule that featured 19 of a possible 22 games against playoff teams. With each contest, he hoped a new-look Eagles group would get closer to the type that could do damage once the playoffs came around.

Some of the lumps Shanahan took finally paid off Saturday against Collegium Charter as the Eagles rolled to a 55-35 District 1-4A title game victory. It’s the school’s first district title since 1996.

“This was the plan,” Dougherty said. “This was the goal. This is why our schedule was so competitive in the league and non-league. The hard thing was to keep morale going while we were just not winning games, but we were playing well. Credit to these guys keeping everybody intact and the coaching staff keeping everyone on target and the last two and a half weeks we locked in and we had really good practices and they were ready.”

Bishop Shanahan boys basketball team poses with its District 1-4A championship trophy after defeating Collegium Charter on Saturday at Harriton. (Photo: Owen McCue/CoBL)

Despite the early-season results, his team always believed it could leave its mark on the program and was rewarded with a trophy on Saturday.

Eagles senior guards Ben Rodner-Tims (16) and Charley Fedrico (13) were in double figures for Shanahan and eight other Eagles recorded baskets in the game. Collegium Charter senior Duce Jackson, a 1,000-point scorer, finished a tremendous career with 19 points for the Cougars.

“We kind of knew that everyone was doubting us and they didn’t think we could come in and win this district after our regular season,” senior guard Charley Federico said. “But our team really came together as one the past two games, and we played our best.”

“It’s pretty much been the goal from the start, win a district title,” Rodner-Tims said.

Things were tight in the first quarter Saturday, but the Eagles finished the period strong and led 15-11 after eight minutes of play. Seven different Shanahan players scored a bucket in the second quarter to take a 32-17 lead into half. It was smooth sailing after that point.

“It was a great feeling, especially after a rough regular season, but we knew we were ready. We knew we were the better team, so we just came out and got an early lead,” Rodner-Tims said.

Shanahan, now 9-15, entered the District 1-4A tournament as the No. 3 seed behind Collegium Charter (14-12) and second-seeded Pope John Paul II (10-11). The Eagles knew they could hang with the Golden Panthers after seeing them multiple times in the summer and fall.

Shanahan rolled PJP, the 2020 and 2021 District 1-4A champions, on Tuesday, 62-44, and had a good feeling they good keep things rolling into Saturday despite a size disadvantage.

“We watched a lot of teams, and we knew how to prepare for them,” Federico said. “We knew we were bigger than Pope John Paul and smaller than Collegium, so we knew which kind of ball to play and that’s the best thing about this team. We adapt to the team we’re playing. We knew what we were doing.”

Shanahan was a District 1-5A semifinalist in 2021-22. The Eagles lost six seniors from that squad. There were a few holdovers, but several others had to step into bigger roles. Dougherty said Shanahan is a “program not a team,” he hopes his well-equipped to reload each season.

Saturday’s result proved him right as the team will be back in the state playoff field for the second straight season.

“We knew what we had,” Rodner-Tims said. “We knew we had some players returning that made a big impact last year. We knew we could win games and win the district.

“We’ve all been playing with each other for awhile like me and Ben have been playing AAU, me and Roman (Alexander) have been playing for a while,” Federico said. “We all really know the way one another plays, so we knew what we were capable of even though not everyone did.”

By Quarter

Collegium 11 | 6 | 8 | 10 || 35

Shanahan 15 | 17 | 7 | 16 || 55

Scoring

Collegium: Duce Jackson 19, Travon Mack 6, Nicholas Kiley 4, Josh Jones-Pinilla 3.

Shanahan: Ben Rodner-Tims 16, Charley Federico 13, Roman Alexander 6, Kevin Scaggs 4, Logan Kapczynski 3, Sean Griffin 3, Matt Seifried 2, Chase Boyle 2, Ryan Ambrose 2, David Maddrey-Rylander 2.