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PIAA 6A: Wilson FTs send Carroll past O'Hara to Hershey

03/20/2023, 10:30pm EDT
By Joseph Santoliquito

 By Joseph Santoliquito (@JSantoliquito)
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GLEN MILLS — They couldn’t feel the ball. Their fingers were icicles. Their hands were frozen blocks. It was around noon on Christmas Day three years ago, 5-foot-9 Archbishop Carroll junior guard Brooke Wilson remembered. Neither Brooke nor her older sister, Taylor, were allowed to go in the house until each made their requisite 10-straight free throws in the basket behind their house.

It took them an hour—though it felt like 10. Their parents would peek out the corners of the back window to check on them. Neither would let the other go inside until 10-straight was made.


Archbishop Carroll's Brooke, left, and Taylor Wilson pose with Hersey bars after Monday's PIAA 6A semifinal win over Cardinal O'Hara. (Photo: Joseph Santoliquito/CoBL)

It was moments like those that created moments like Monday night at packed Garnet Valley High School when Carroll faced off against Catholic League rival Cardinal O’Hara in the PIAA Class 6A girls state semifinals.

With 5.3 seconds remaining, Army-bound Taylor could feel the ball—and the season—in her hands this time. Like a few years back, Taylor, ice pumping through her veins, nailed the game-deciding free throws in Carroll’s 31-30 victory.

The Patriots (16-13) will now face District 3 champion Cedar Cliff, a 55-47 overtime winner over Norwin, on Friday at 6 p.m. for the PIAA Class 6A state championship at Hershey’s Giant Center.

Carroll went as the Wilson sisters went. Brooke finished with a game-high 16 and Taylor ended with 12 to combine for 28 of Carroll’s 31 points, with Courtland Schumacher responsible for the Patriots’ other three points.

O’Hara’s standout sophomore Molly Rullo led O’Hara with 15, while her freshman sister Megan added 7 for a Lions team that started three juniors, a senior, and a sophomore, with a freshman, Megan, the first player off the bench.

While O’Hara (23-6) has a great future ahead, the present belongs to Carroll.

This is the first time the Patriots have reached the state championship since 2019 as a Class 5A, when they lost to Chartiers Valley. Carroll last won a girls’ state basketball championship in 2011 as a Class 4A when the PIAA ran a Class 4A system, and in 2009 as a Class 3A under the 4A system.

The Wilson sisters have a few District 12 titles to their credit in their amazing careers. Going out with a state championship would top off everything, while making the last time the two may ever play with each other again.

“It’s why each one of these games are so important to me,” Brooke said. “Taylor’s my hero. Friday we’re all going to play together and we’re all going to have fun. I knew when Taylor was on the line in the last seconds, I knew she was going to make it. We would stay up late at night until we would make 10 foul shots in a row. We would do it until around 9 at night. We did for hours for situations like this.

“We’ve been doing it ever since we first picked up a basketball when I was seven and she was eight. It was huge that Taylor won it. She’s had an amazing career and she’s done it working harder than anyone I know. We haven’t won anything. But if anyone deserves a state championship, it’s Taylor.”

It’s Taylor that made it happen.

With O’Hara up, 30-29, hanging on a pair of Molly Rullo free throws, Taylor drove to the basket in the game’s waning seconds and was fouled. She hit both, giving the Pats the one-point edge. A desperation shot by O’Hara sailed high off the backboard and it rained Hershey kisses on the dancing Carroll team.

“I think about it before games, knowing these are the last games with Brooke,” Taylor said. “I practice foul shots every day. Foul shots are the easiest shots. I never won a Catholic League title. We won the District 12 title and this is the furthest we’ve ever been in the state playoffs. We played our hearts out tonight.

“We know O’Hara. They know us. We executed our offense. The refs let us play, and it was both sides. It went both ways. It was a very physical game. We’re going to the state championship. I’ve dreamed of that since I started playing Carroll basketball. We get to go to practice tomorrow, and I get to play with Brooke one last time.”

O’Hara had its chances. Up 30-29, an O’Hara missed front end of a one-and-one gave Carroll new life.

“My kids competed their butts off and that’s how we got here,” O’Hara coach Chrissie Doogan said. “No one in that gym expected us to be in the Final Four, and they probably didn’t expect Carroll to be in the Final Four either. They did it by competing. They competed all season for me. Where they were November 19, to where they are on March 20th, is just a tribute to their hard work.

“They were in the gym extra; they were just a fun group to be around. We knew this was going to be a tough game. I told my kids we would be happy winning 35-30. That’s what we said at halftime. It’s not going to be a 62-40 game. It’s going to be in the 30s. I thought we defended them really well.

“The (Wilsons) are great players. They’re two Division I kids who are carrying their team and we have two Division I kids carrying our team. We knew it would be a grind-it-out type of game. It was just unfortunate (how it ended).”

It hasn’t ended yet for the Wilson sisters.

By Quarter

Cardinal O’Hara (23-6):  8  | 8  |  6  | 8 ||  30

Archbishop Carroll (16-13):  4   | 16  |  7  |  4 ||  31

Scoring

O’Hara: Molly Rullo 15, Megan Rullo 7, Joanie Quinn 6, Carly Coleman 2.

Carroll: Brooke Wilson 16, Taylor Wilson 12, Courtland Schumacher 3.
~~~

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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