City of Basketball Love

Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue)
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WEST CHESTER — Brady Krautzel had plenty of practice for the biggest play of his basketball career thus far.

The Garnet Valley junior grew up playing driveway pick-up games with older brother Jack and Jack’s best friend, Quinn O’Hara. For a long, long time now, Brady has known to be ready when O’Hara has the ball in his hands.

“I’ve been playing with Quinn for a while — not as long as Jack has, but pickup games and everywhere, so you learn tendencies,” Brady said. “Whenever Quinn drives, he’s always a pass-first kind of player. He always looks for the open man.”

So when O’Hara started making his way toward the hoop Tuesday night in a District 1 6A semifinal against No. 2 seed West Chester Henderson, Krautzel spotted up. He took the pass he knew was coming and buried a 3-point look from the left corner with 29.4 seconds left, which held up as the game-winner in a 50-46 win. 

The clutch pass and shot sent 14th-seed Garnet Valley to the District 1 6A championship on Saturday against Central League rival and top seed Lower Merion at Temple Liacouras Center. It’s the program’s first district title game since 1997 and first ever in the large-school classification.

“We just know each other really well, and I think our chemistry is one thing teams don’t have,” O’Hara said. “Not everybody is blessed enough to have teammates who they can call brothers, so the chemistry, we can trust each other, we can lean on each other. That’s such a huge thing.”

Garnet Valley junior Brady Krautzel, left, and senior Quinn O'Hara connected on the game winning shot of Tuesday's District 1-6A semifinal win over West Chester Henderson. (Photo: Owen McCue/CoBL)

Henderson senior Nyle Ralph-Beyer scored 22 points and Connor Fleet scored 21 in the loss. They combined for 43 of Henderson’s 46 points as a Jesse Smith first-quarter three was the Warriors’ (23-5) only other bucket. 

Fleet scored seven straight in the fourth to erase a four-point deficit. After junior Dylan DeLucia pressured the Jags (19-8) into a turnover, Fleet made a pair of free throws to give Henderson a 46-45 lead with 41.4 seconds remaining. 

It looked like he had an answer to Brady’s go-ahead three on the next possession, getting into the lane and putting up a good attempt that hit the front of the rim. Brady grabbed the board and sunk a pair of free throws with 13.4 seconds left to secure the win.

“Nyle and Connor have been terrific,” Henderson coach Jason Ritter said. “They’ve been carrying us all season, and we can’t expect them to keep shouldering the load. Our role players, they’re fighting like hell to get something to drop, and tonight wasn’t our night. The last couple nights it was. Shots were dropping, and tonight it wasn’t and (Garnet Valley) made timely shots. 

“It hurts, but that’s the game of basketball. There’s gotta be a loser, and unfortunately it was us tonight.”

Ralph-Beyer had 14 in the first half to give Henderson a 27-17 halftime lead. Another triple early in the third put the Warriors ahead by 11. Then Garnet Valley rattled off 14 straight to take its first lead since the opening period on an assist from O’Hara to Jack Krautzel for three.

The teams entered the fourth tied 36-36 before Garnet Valley took a quick 40-36 less than two minutes into the period.

Junior Jake Sniras led the Jaguars with 13, Jack Krautzel followed with 10 and Brady Krautzel, O’Hara and freshman forward Grayson Golek added nine apiece. O’Hara added four second-half assists to his line.

The last one didn’t happen by accident. 

“After practice all the time, in 3-v-3 games and all that, that play’s been made 100 more times that people don’t see,” Brady Krautzel said. “That’s not the first time, a lucky shot. That’s a Quinn drive that he does all the time to get someone open, and a shot that goes in. That’s happened many times."

His clutch bucket was followed by a chest bump with O'Hara and a high-five with Jack, who crashed the boards for a rebound after he saw the shot go up despite the fact he claims he knew it was in.

“He’s never been somebody to be nervous or back away from the moment,” Jack said. “You saw him at the foul line too. He came up to me right away and said, ‘We’re going to Temple.’ He knew he was making it. He’s somebody who’s always confident down the stretch, and we always believe in him.”

The Jaguars have pulled off three upsets now, opening at home with a win over No. 19 Harriton before picking up road upsets over No. 3 Spring-Ford, No. 6 Methacton and No. 2 Henderson.

Their Cinderella run will be put to the test against the Aces, who took them down twice during the regular season — 85-69 on Dec. 12 and 62-58 on Jan. 27.

“We definitely think it’s a team that we’ve played twice this year and we’ve grown both games, so why not grow a third game and take home a district championship,” Brady Krautzel said.

“Really, we don’t see ourselves as underdogs,” O’Hara said. “We embrace that from the outside view, but we know going into every game that we’re going to give them our best shot.”

Garnet Valley 50, West Chester Henderson 46

By Quarter

Garnet Valley:  12 | 5 | 19 | 14 || 50
WC Henderson:  16 | 11 | 9 | 10 || 46

Scoring

Garnet Valley: Jake Sniras 13, Jack Krautzel 10, Quinn O’Hara 9, Brady Krautzel 9, Grayson Golek 9.

WC Henderson: Nyle Ralph-Beyer 22, Connor Fleet 21, Jesse Smith 3.