City of Basketball Love

By Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3)
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PHILADELPHIA — The Palestra, overtime games and Archbishop Wood had not meshed well historically.

Three times, the Vikings had gone to overtime at the historic gym while playing for a PCL championship and three times they had come up empty. When Monday’s title clash against Archbishop Carroll found itself going to an extra session, a few of the ghosts in the rafters certainly made note of that.

None of the current Vikings knew that history and they avoided it anyway, eschewing one overtime for two before outlasting the Patriots 54-52 to win their first PCL crown since 2020-21.

“It’s a once in a lifetime moment,” Wood senior Alexa Windish said. “You don’t get here often, it’s such a cool experience and this environment is crazy, so to get here and win, it’s something we all talked about for a very long time.”

Wood lost in overtime in 2011-12, 2018-19 and 2019-20 on Penn’s campus and it had been Carroll downing the Vikings in 2012 and 2019. The Patriots, who were chasing their first title since that OT win in 2019, more than made Wood earn its spoils.

The Archbishop Wood girls basketball team celebrates with the PCL title following Monday's double overtime win over Archbishop Carroll. (Photo: Gavin Bethell/CoBL)

In the regular season meeting, Carroll saw an 11-point lead with 3:46 left in regulation erode in a 16-0 Wood win that very much helped the Vikings to an undefeated league season. Anyone that looked at that result as a precursor or script on how Monday would go clearly doesn’t know these teams.

“They definitely weren’t going away,” Wood junior Emily Knouse said. “We knew we needed to stick with each other. Fortunately, all four of us have that experience and I think we kept relying on each other and following our seniors.”

Vikings senior Ava Renninger led all scorers with 22 points, including her 1,000th career tally, which was highlighted by an 8-of-8 showing at the stripe in the second overtime. The 5-foot-6 guard felt she owed it to her teammates after an uncharacteristically sloppy finish to regulation.

Certainly most grating were the pair of free throws she missed with 25.1 to play in the fourth quarter, opening a door for Carroll that the Patriots couldn’t slip through while missing two point-blank shots at the rim in the waning seconds.

“I was frustrated with myself because I couldn’t close it out at the end,” Renninger said. “I knew if I was given another opportunity to close the game out, then I was going to knock those shots down.”

While Wood’s four captains met a question about the team’s overtime history in The Palestra without an answer, it was before their time, their coach allowed a small smirk. Now, Mike McDonald could talk about it although the Wood coach instead chided his senior point guard about her missed foul shots that even made it a talking point in the first place.

“Hey, I made the other ones,” Renninger said.

For every team that gets to revel in a landmark victory like Monday’s, there’s a team that has to swallow the agony of defeat. Last year, it was Wood following a 50-47 loss to Lansdale Catholic and the Vikings’ quartet of captains heaped plenty of praise on Carroll following the game.

Carroll, simply, refused to quit. The Patriots trailed - by five, by four, by three - at points in the fourth quarter and by twice by two in the first overtime.

Each time, they would come back.

“Their resiliency was great,” Carroll coach Renie Shields said. “You could tell both teams were really tired, both teams dug in and it was a very competitive game. They put the ball in the basket one more time than we did.”

The Patriots led most of the first half and a majority of the third quarter, a three by Alexis Eberz with 5:23 left in the period putting the third seed ahead 32-26. Wood responded with six straight points, four coming from Windish to tie it up going to the final frame.

Windish, who played briefly in last season’s final, drained a three to open the fourth to give Wood its first lead since the early first quarter. It was only the beginning of a slug-it-out finish.

All of Wood’s offense came from the four captains, Lauren Greer preceding Windish with a timely three in the third quarter just as it seemed Carroll might slip away.

“We all go to each other before every quarter just to make sure we’re on the same page,” Windish said. “It’s important for us to make sure we’re composed, especially in overtime, to not get in our own heads or start doing things that are stupid. We really rely on each other and it’s good thing we have this year with how close we are.”

“We kept saying its not over until the final buzzer goes off,” Greer said. “It gave us motivation to keep pushing each other to the very last minute.”

Wood had its captains in Knouse, Renninger, Greer and Windish, the quartet coming together at each stoppage to keep rehashing the message of togetherness.

Carroll had Brooke Wilson, with the senior playing an outstanding game on both ends of the floor and as usual, authoring at least some role in her team’s biggest plays of the night. Down three with 2:35 left in the fourth, it was the Army recruit slinging a dime across the court to Olivia Nardi for a trey that tied it 41-41, the same score it would read at the start of overtime.

Trailing by a score in the first overtime and seemingly trapped in the post, Wilson somehow contorted around and defender and found the cutting Abbie McFillin for the tying layup with 1:26 to go.

“You can look at ‘I didn’t make the last shot,’ or ‘I didn’t do this,’ but what she does for our team, it’s just amazing,” Shields said. “She defends the best player then you say ‘oh, by the way, run the offense, go get it when they’re in trouble.’ The other kids stepped up tonight, played strong defense and really complimented the way she plays.”

Wilson had 12 points and seven assists, the senior twice giving Carroll a last sliver of life by hitting a deep three with 4.6 seconds that left that cut the lead to 53-52.

“We knew they were going to be the toughest opponent we’d played all year,” Renninger said. “We knew this was going to be a great game. They have a great coach, a great coaching staff, great players that are going to give it their all until the last buzzer goes off just like us. We knew it would be a close, tight game.”

Carroll will look to regroup then head into the PIAA 6A tournament, where the Patriots happen to be the defending champions. A couple calls will certainly linger with them, and the unfortunate side of a great game is that one team has to walk away carrying those questions.

“We knew what they do, they drive, draw and kick,” Shields said. “I thought we did a good job on the threes. They got a lot more foul shots than we did, and that’s where the difference in the game was, they drove more than we did.”

There’s no environment that can replicate a fully-packed Palestra, especially one riled up by a close game on the floor like on Monday. Try as they might to stay focused on the game, it’s nearly impossible for a high school athlete to ignore all the noise going on around them.

Well, maybe most of the noise.

“Free throws,” Renninger said. “It gets really, really loud. It’s kind of hard to hear (McDonald) when he’s yelling, screaming at us. We can’t hear him, some of the time maybe we don’t want to but it gets very hard, especially when it starts to get packed up and those Carroll fans were getting really, really loud.”

A benefit of all that noise is that does tend to drown out any lingering spirits high above who may be wondering if there’d be another chapter in Wood’s overtime history at the Palestra ending the same as the last three. If those conversations were happening, this group of Vikings probably woud have ignored them anyway.

The last thing McDonald does before the Vikings come out on the floor is ask his team a question. Flanked by her three other co-captains, Greer looked to her coach to replicate the moment.

“Who do you play for?” McDonald asked.

“The person next to you,” Greer said.

 By Quarter
Carroll: 13  |  11  |   8   |   9   |   4   |   7   ||  52
Wood:  10  |  11  |  11  |   9   |   4   |   9   ||  54

Shooting

Carroll: 18-41 FG (8-14 3PT), 8-9 FT

Wood: 15-36 FG (5-13 3PT), 19-22 FT

Scoring

Carroll: Alexis Eberz 12, Brooke Wilson 12, Maddie McFillin 10, Olivia Nardi 9, Felicity McFillin 5, Abbie McFillin 4

Wood: Ava Renninger 22, Emily Knouse 15, Alexa Windish 9, Lauren Greer 8