City of Basketball Love

By Joseph Santoliquito (@JSantoliquito)
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PHILADELPHIA — West Catholic coach Miguel Bocachica held it in his arms like a precious jewel that he would never let go. It was a tangible piece of history that he and his team made Friday night.

It’s become a ritual through the years to look at the blue banners hanging in the historic West Catholic gym. They’re mostly blue, with a few dates in gold embossed on them. One banner still carries the 1959 date, the last time the Burrs won the Catholic League championship. The other banner up on the wall carries three dates: 1949, 1952 and 1953.

It's those dates that will be getting company, after West Catholic’s 77-60 victory over MCS on Friday night at West Philadelphia High School in the PIAA District 12 Class 3A championship, or what used to be the Philadelphia City championship.

It’s the first time the Burrs won the city title in 70 years. It’s the first time a West Catholic boys’ basketball team won any title in 64 years, when they last won the Catholic League title.

It marked Bocachica’s first championship as a head coach.

“The last banner that says city championship at West Catholic was 1953,” said Bocachica, who’s in his fifth year as head coach of the Burrs. “The city championship banner is a banner that we look at often. This is my first personal piece of hardware. I was part of a few of these at Imhotep.

“But we need to get used to collecting hardware. This game was kind of a business-as-usual kind of a game. It was a low-energy game for us. We weren’t too far off the box as to who we are. It’s 1953. We had a few rocky years when I started here, then we had COVID and we lost to MSC last year.

“This is the first piece of hardware for the boys’ basketball program since 1953. I know it’s hard to believe. But it happened.”

The game itself was rather anti-climactic. The contest was tied at 4-4, then West Catholic went on an 18-0 blitz and took control. That was it. The Mighty Elephants got within double-digits once after that, 48-39, with 1:42 left in the third quarter. Then the Burrs shut the doors, going on a 12-2 tear to regain a comfortable cushion.

West’s Coppin-state bound guard Adam “Bud” Clark led all scorers with 27 points, while MCS’s Nayeem Johnson finished with a team-high 17. West’s Zion Stanford (Temple commit) had 18 and Amyr Walker chipped in with 16.

“We knew the history and we knew we weren’t able to get any new dates on the PCL title, we get a chance to do it on the city title banner,” Walker said. “We have more history to make. We have a state title to shoot for. Right now, we’re playing really good defense. I was pretty angry the last time I played, against Neumann-Goretti (in the PCL semifinals in overtime).”

Clark was the Burrs’ heartbeat. He controlled the tempo, the Burrs’ offense, and knew how important winning was.

“I look at the banner often and our coaches point at the blue space on our banners,” Clark said. “It feels good to finally change that city banner. We’ve been playing like every game is our last game. We need to win six in a row and get that state championship. We need to play a little more under control, but that’s something we can work in practice.

“This is really big for us. West Catholic still hasn’t won a boys’ basketball state championship yet. There’s no banner for that. We’re trying to change that this year.”

By Quarter

West Catholic (15-10):  25  | 12  |  16  | 24 ||  77

MCS (16-10):  6   | 16  |  19  |  19 ||  60

Scoring

West Catholic: Adam Clark 27, Zion Stanford 18, Amyr Walker 16, Micah Waters 11, Marcus Branker 2, Isaac Cole 2, Mike Singleton 1.

MCS: Nayeem Johnson 17, Chauncey Pressley 9, Jeff King 8, Alantay Dawson 7, Isaiah Griffin 6, Mohamed Sesay 6, Saaid Lee 3, Kevin Carter 2, Aiden Brown 2.

Imhotep girls grab first District 12 title since 2018

Imhotep Charter’s Samya Stevens and Anise Geiger combined for 19 of the Panthers’ 24 fourth-quarter points in breaking open a close came with West Catholic girls, winning, 51-39.

Stevens, one of the Panthers’ few seniors, finished with a game-high 16 points and 5-foot-11 sophomore Geiger closed with 15.

Imhotep led, 27-24, entering the fourth quarter before those two took control, leading the Panthers to their first PIAA District 12 Class 3A championship since 2018.

“This is my first year winning the city championship,” Stevens said. “We had a lot of ups-and-downs this season on and off the court. Coming into this game, we had a lot of determination. We knew has to stick together and fight.

“We played a lot of team basketball, especially on defense. We had to find out to get the ball to our bigs, how to get them the ball low and high.”

Geiger was a machine. Each time she got the ball, she drove to the basket. After a slow start, the athletic sophomore was 3-for-3 from the floor and scored nine points in the pivotal fourth quarter.

“I saw a lot more communication on defense, and our whole attitude was up,” Geiger said. “I’m proud of my team and I’m happy for Samya. She goes out winning a state championship.”

West battled, but turnovers and missed shots in the end hurt the Lady Burrs. Burrs’ coach Messiah Reames has made nice strides with a young team, which started four freshmen, Jalyn Moore, Ciana Blake, Laila Farmer, Jasmine Butler and Ciani Scott, and one senior, Amina Reid.

“The effort was there, we just had some blown assignments on defense left us in a bad spot,” Reames said. “We are a small team, but we really aren’t team that concerns ourselves with height. We use heart of height, and just came up short.”

By Quarter

West Catholic (15-10):  7   | 10  |  7  |  14 || 38

Imhotep Charter (15-11):  11  | 8  |  8  | 24 ||  51

Scoring

West: Jasmine Butler 11, Amina Reid 10, Jalyn Moore 8, Ciani Scott 7, KhadijahThomas 2.

Imhotep Charter: Samya Stevens 16, Anise Geiger 15, Trio Ebo 6, Sabria Mann 5, Ky’janae Cooper 4, Calista Gaymon 3, Garen Hawthorne 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.