City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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(Ed. Note: This story is part of CoBL’s “Prepping for Preps” series, which will take a look at many of the top high school programs in the region as part of our 2023-24 season preview coverage. The complete list of schools previewed thus far can be found here.)

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It’s a new era at Germantown Academy, though one with a lot of familiar faces.

Lauren Power has taken over as the Patriots’ new head coach, the Sherri Retif reign over after 25 seasons of overwhelming success in Fort Washington. The GA girls haven’t won the last few Inter-Ac titles but they won 20 in her years, the last coming in 2019, an unprecedented run of success in the small, highly-competitive private-school league. 

They’ve got a roster this year ready to reclaim the title, but that means overthrowing two-time defending champ Penn Charter as well as the rest of a seven-team league which has seen great improvement in its lower half. 

Power knows exactly what she’s gotten into. The Archbishop Ryan product had spent the last five seasons at Notre Dame, one of PC’s biggest league rivals, guiding the Irish to a second-place finish last season — tied with the Patriots. Now she’+s getting used to wearing black, red and blue instead of blue and gold, 

“It’s been awesome so far and as seamless as you think it would be,” she told CoBL. “That’s a credit to the girls and who they are — they’ve been so welcoming, they’re so hard-working, they’re just a great group of girls who really care about each other and support each other. They’re a joy to be around and they’re a joy to coach. 

“It’s been going great, and we have a lot of talent behind that, which makes it even more fun.”

Senior guard Isabella Casey noted a few changes from what was to what is, including an increased emphasis on weightlifting, but a ton of continuity on the roster — including assistant coach Andre Strothers — has helped the sailing stay smooth all fall.

“We return pretty much everyone but Kendall [Bennett], so it should be a pretty similar team,” she said. “I think we’re going to play really hard, Coach Power puts an emphasis on that…I think it should be a really fun season.”

“I think the biggest difference is the offense that we’re running,” Casey added. “We’re running a lot more screen action this year and getting it into the high post. Last year we ran a lot of five-out offense. [...] Similarly, they’re both intense and they’re really into it, and they both really care about us.”

Gone from last year’s Patriots (19-11, 9-3) is Bennett, the 6-foot-2 post now in the rotation at Binghamton. But just about every else returns, an upperclassman core that’s been itching to bring a trophy back to the school joined by some promising freshmen and sophomores.

The senior class features Casey (5-10), sisters Jess Aponik (5-11) and Jenn Aponik (5-6) and point guard Sam Wade (5-10), all significant pieces a year ago. Junior wing Gabby Bowes (5-10) and Jess Kolecki (5-8) round out the returning core, which should form the top part of Power’s rotation. It’s a good with good overall size and shooting ability, with Jess Aponik — a Kutztown commit — plus Casey and Bowes capable of playing inside and out.

After that group, Power has some interesting youth to throw into the mix and see how they respond. Sophomore wing Anna Weber (5-8), freshman forward Claire McKee (6-0) and freshman forward Jo Owens (6-2) are all on the varsity roster, and all will have a chance to show what they can do.

“I love what Anna Weber brings, just her intensity and her motor,” Power said. “She’s somebody who’s got so much potential to really make a splash, I see her coming off the bench and being an energy player, a really good defender for us who’s going to be a spark plug. She’s been really impressive. And Claire McKee, our freshmen, things are really starting to click for her and she reminds me of a young Kendall Bennett.”

They’re going to need all hands on deck to prevent Penn Charter from achieving a three-peat, with the Quakers’ future D-I duo of junior Kaylinn Bethea and freshman Ryan Carter both back from a team that made the PAISAA state championship game. And that’s before factoring in a Notre Dame squad that adds the league’s best freshman in Riley Davis, or much-improved Agnes Irwin and SCH Academy teams. 

Power said she’s not thinking about the Jan. 3 game against Notre Dame, or the return trip on Feb. 12. There’s too much to worry about before a game that’s sure to be emotional on both sides, for all sorts of reasons; Casey and Bowes were teammates the last few summers with ND’s Lizzie Halligan, the trio winning the Hoop Group Summer League this offseason with the Lady Runnin’ Rebels. (Casey summed it up: “They’re going to be a war. They’re going to be crazy.”) 

The connection between the two programs has, however, popped up in practice from time to time. 

“I was putting (a play) in, I’m like I’m going to have to change the name on this, so I’ll get back to you on the name,” Power recalled. “(There’s) joking around, (the GA players are) like ‘oh yeah, they’re going to be coming for you.’

“Off the court, we’re all people, we all have really good relationships with each other, and when you step on the court it’s going to be a different animal. There’s definitely some poking around on that, and these girls know how to have fun with it.

“We’re striving for huge goals, certainly we have a league championship — in their words, we’re chip-chasing — but at the same time we want to have fun doing it and they certainly know how to do that, they’re having a great time.”