City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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WEST CHESTER — Zuri Harris admitted something he maybe shouldn’t have — he checks his phone at halftime of games. The Coatesville senior has a specific reason for doing so, however: it’s to see if there’s anything his dad, Steven Harris, has texted him, usually a couple words of encouragement. 

During Coatesville’s Ches-Mont championship game against West Chester Henderson at WCU’s Hollinger Gymnasium, Harris, once again, snuck a quick peek at the screen. And there was a message from his dad, as usual, just when he needed it. 

“He just said ‘keep being aggressive, you’re doing a great job,’” Zuri Harris said. “Even pre-game, he was saying just ‘visualize everything you want to do, you’ve played them twice, this is the biggest game you’ve played so far, just do what you do.’”

Harris took those words to heart, then came out with a huge second half to lead Coatesville to a 69-60 win over Henderson in front of a crowd of over 1,800 packed into Hollinger.The 6-foot-tall combo guard finished with a team-high 22 points, adding seven rebounds, three assists and a steal as Coatesville snapped a seven-year streak without a Ches-Mont title, the 2017 Raiders’ squad the last one to get it done. 

He scored 12 of those points in the fourth quarter, a pair of back-to-back 3-pointers to open the period and put his team up 54-42 after a monster third quarter put Coatesville (18-6) in control, then went 6-of-6 from the line down the stretch, his last points sending the Henderson fans streaming to the exits with 34 seconds to play.

“Amazing feeling,” he said. “This far, I haven’t won anything. No Ches-Monts, no districts, no states. 

“Winning this game is huge, but that’s only one of three. We’ve got districts, we’ve got states, there’s way more to come.”

Coatesville coach John Allen, upon finding out about Harris’ habit of sneaking a look at his phone, wasn’t the least bit upset.

“If that’s going to make (Zuri) play like that, (Steven) can come up here and talk to him at halftime,” he said, laughing. “I’m cool with it.”

While Coatesville had been waiting for seven years for the trophy, Allen’s wait had been even longer. The 2001 Coatesville alum led the school to league, district and state tournament titles as a senior before departing for Seton Hall, but those were the last trophies he’d ever won in-season as either a player or coach. 

Fittingly, he was wearing the 2001 state championship shirt under his Coatesville quarter-zip, a 23-year-old tee that brought some good luck with it.

“It feels awesome for the city, it feels awesome for the kids,” he said. “We just put so much work in, in the 10 months before this. We started working and this is what we wanted, this is what we wanted. We wanted to start here and obviously we want to end with a state championship. But we’re going to end this and go celebrate because this group, this group really, really earned. This group of players, this group of parents, this group of coaches, we really earned it.”

Harris hit a pair of 3-pointers in the first half, which mostly belonged to Nyle Ralph-Beyer, Nelson Lamizana and Henderson (21-4). The Warriors led 29-23 at the break in the rubber match between the two Ches-Mont National rivals, who each won on their home court during the regular season.

But the second half was all Coatesville, which dominated the third quarter 25-9 to flip the game on its head. 

Lamizana, a 6-8 senior forward who cleaned the glass with a 16-rebound effort and also added nine points and four blocks, scored just one point after halftime. Ralph-Beyer had 15 of his 21 points in the first half, but the sharpshooting 6-4 Sacred Heart commit was 0-4 from 3-point range in the second half. 

“We started to make shots, we started to focus in and lock in on their individual players, that’s who it starts with,” Allen said. “Nelson, Nyle (were) unbelievable in the first half and we started to lock in on those two, we did a great job.”

Sophomore guard Larry Brown scored seven points in the third quarter, reserve forward Armon Shockley firing up the crowd with a steal and and-one layup. But it was senior guard Marquis Peoples who had his biggest contribution in the period, scoring 10 of his 13 points in those crucial eight minutes.

Peoples gave the Raiders a huge boost going into the fourth, knocking down a late 3-pointer and beating the buzzer with a mid-range jumper which hit the rim once and bounced high up, then rattled around for a second before falling through.

“Like Kawhi Leonard,” he said afterwards, a big smile on his face. “I was like please go in, and when it finally did go in, I got so excited. I don’t know, it was a rush of excitement.”

Henderson kept pace for most of the fourth, then made it interesting by cutting the lead to six on a steal-and-layup by Jesse Smith with under a minute to play. But Brown, Coatesville’s sophomore starting post, knocked down a clutch pair of free throws to extend the lead back to eight. 

Brown, who finished with 14 points, four rebounds and three blocks, also had a strong semifinal game with 14 points and three rebounds against Sun Valley; he hit multiple jumpers in both games and showed his improved ball-handling abilities as well.

“He’s still an underclassman, he’s working really hard and those big minutes helped us,” Harris said. “Those shots last game, and he knocked down the free throws that helped us win the (championship), what else could you ask for from a 6-7 center?”

Shockley finished with eight points and two steals. Junior guard Amon Fowlkes added 7 points and two steals; senior guard Dior Kennedy had six points, four rebounds and three assists. 

Coatesville gets a week off until it begins District 1 6A tournament play as the No. 5 seed, hosting either No. 12 Cheltenham or No. 21 North Penn next Tuesday. If it’s North Penn, that would be a rematch of last year’s district second-round game, which North Penn won; they met again in the PIAA 6A second round, which Coatesville won to make the state final eight. 

There’s two more big goals ahead: chasing the school’s first district and state championships since Allen wore the uniform.

“I don’t want to give them too much time off,” Allen said, “but I want them to enjoy it, I want them to go to school and enjoy being champions. I want our coaches to enjoy being champions and our city to enjoy being champions for a night. 

“Maybe I’ll give them a day off.”

By Quarter
Henderson:  14  |  15  |   9   |  22  ||  60
Coatesville:  13  |  10  |  25  |  21  ||  69

Shooting
Henderson: 18-42 FG (4-17 3PT), 20-24 FT
Coatesville: 22-45 FG (6-14 3PT), 20-32 FT

Scoring
Henderson: Nyle Ralph-Beyer 21, Connor Fleet 17, Nelson Lamizana 9, Jesse Smith 5, Aaron Nelson 4, Jack Bell 2, Dylan DeLucia 2

Coatesville: Zuri Harris 22, Larry Brown 14, Marquis Peoples 13, Armon Shockley 8, Amon Fowlkes 7, Dior Kennedy 6