City of Basketball Love

Andrew Robinson (@ADrobinson3)
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BUCKINGHAM — Central Bucks East girls basketball knew it had potential, it just had to find the best way to use it.

The undefeated Patriots faced their biggest test of the season thus far Tuesday, hosting North Penn with first place in the Suburban One League Colonial Division on the line. East played as it has all season, the team in-tune with each player fulfilling their responsibilities to down the Knights 65-56 and improve to 6-0 and 5-0 in the SOL.

“What makes us stand out is everyone knows their role,” Patriots senior co-captain Chantal Van Dongeren said. “Everyone does their best to fill their role, and that allows us to have five solid players on the court that are always contributing.”

Van Dongeren was the only Patriot who didn’t score Tuesday, but the senior knows that’s not her role. She’s on the floor for her defense, always against the opposing team’s top player, so it’s one less thing for her teammates to worry about.

Anna Barry very much appreciates it. The sharpshooting guard, East’s other co-captain and only other senior, fills a lot of roles for her team and as a four-year varsity player and understands quite well how everyone doing their part adds up to a greater result.

“That’s what makes a really good team,” Barry said. “When everyone is sticking to their role instead of not being what they’re not, it makes a team come together.”

Barry scored 23 points while sophomore Jess Lockwood had 24, the duo edging out North Penn’s top two scorers on the night in Caleigh Sperling (17) and Cam Crowley (13). It was the most prolific offensive outing of the season thus far for the Patriots, most of their previous scores having been in the 40s, but a needed one against a Knights team that started equally hot.

At times, the first half seemed “layups optional” with both sides connecting on multiple 3-point shots. Unquestionably, the two biggest came from Barry with the senior converting a four-point play to tie the game 27-27 late in the second quarter before hitting a ridiculous half-court heave at the buzzer for a 30-27 advantage the Patriots wouldn’t relinquish.

“You can’t not get hype when she hits a huge half-court shot like that,” Van Dongeren said. “I had to go up and hug her.”

Undoubtedly, CB East has done a lot of things right in getting to 6-0. Patriots coach Liz Potash doesn’t need to look far to see where it all starts.

“You have really strong leadership with those two seniors at the top,” Potash said. “Anna has played at a high level for four years, Chantal for three years, so it starts with their strong leadership and then we have all of these pieces that when you put them together, it’s really jelled well.

“What’s so great about this team is they don’t care who scores, as long as somebody scores.”

Save for the opening stretch of the third quarter when the Patriots opened on an 8-0 run to create a 14-point lead, the Knights went shot-for-shot with the hosts. East knew it had to score to win, another example of the team adapting to each game it has played so far this season.

Tuesday’s game was a little different than Saturday’s, where East handed previously unbeaten West Chester Rustin its first loss. Having players comfortable in their roles allows the team some flexibility when one game plays out differently than the last.

“We always try to play our own game,” Barry said. “In a game like this, we see they’re scoring points and hitting shots even when we’re playing good defense, we know that we’re going to have to score more than them.”

Tuesday was Lockwood’s night to shine. The sophomore forward added the stretch to her game, stepping out and hitting four 3-point looks, tying Barry for the game high, then came up big on the glass late with seven of her nine rebounds in the fourth.

Other games have seen Natalie Berndt or Sydney Ralph step up in other ways, and freshman Haley Moran understands her role coming off the bench.

“We take our scout very, very seriously,” Van Dongeren said. “We’re watching teams ahead of time to be prepared for their best players coming at us, looking for what we can do to elevate our offense against any specific defense they play, however they help, anything like that to help us play to the best of our ability.”

East will carry its unblemished record into the start of the SOL’s crossover play with a visit to Council Rock South. After that, it’s off to Florida for a few days between Christmas and New Year’s Eve then right back to the Suburban One gauntlet.

“It’s been fun watching this team come together,” Potash said. “We went into the season saying we knew there was a lot of potential. We knew we could play with anyone; we don’t always know if we can beat anyone, but we can always compete with anyone.”

“We knew we had the potential, but it’s a long season,” Barry said. “We didn’t know if we’d get off to a rough start. We didn’t know if it would all jell together, but I’m very happy to be here at 6-0.”

By Quarter

Central Bucks East: 18 | 12 | 16 | 19 || 65

North Penn: 15 | 12 | 10 | 19 || 56

Scoring

Central Bucks East: Jess Lockwood 24, Anna Barry 23, Sydney Ralph 10, Natalie Berndt 4, Haley Moran 4

North Penn: Caleigh Sperling 17, Cam Crowley 13, Kelly Donnelly 9, Lily Brown 8, Liv Stone 6, Leah Mikulski 3