City of Basketball Love

Joseph Santoliquito (@jsantoliquito)
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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 2024-25 season preview coverage. The complete list of schools previewed thus far can be found here.)

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It’s been eight months and it still stings.

It is not exactly the way the Abington boys’ basketball team envisioned the end of its season. The Ghosts felt they had a few more weeks in them, not crumble as a No. 9 seed in the first round of the District 1 Class 6A playoffs under the 58-42 upset loss to No. 24 seed Springfield (Delco) in mid-February.The surprise setback forced head coach Dan Marsh to do some re-evaluating in his second season before Abington took the court again this fall.

From the outside looking in, Abington had a highly successful year in Marsh’s transition from Abington’s girls’ basketball coach for 18 years to the boy’s side, moving in for previous longtime coach Charles Grasty, who became Abington’s athletic director in May 2023. In Marsh’s first year on the boy’s side, the Ghosts finished 18-7 overall and 12-4 in the Suburban One Liberty, three games behind the SOL Liberty winner Upper Dublin.

Again, it looked glossy from the outside. But the Springfield district playoff loss may have revealed what was lying underneath.

“Last year was my first year (on the boy’s side) and I was really trying to get to know the players and get them to know the system that I wanted,” said Marsh, who in 18 years with the Abington girls won District 1 titles in 2010 and 2017, and had the Ghosts consistent contenders for Suburban One League and state titles. “What we really learned is that we have to rely on defense, and outwork people. We got right back into the gym after the playoffs ended. We have been working ever since. This is a real hard-working group. Defense is our mantra. We know we can always rely on our defense.

“These guys share the ball really well. They are very vocal. They very much have an ownership of this team and that’s refreshing. This is a refreshing change. It’s a big difference from what I had last year. Again, when you roll into a program new and I had 12 seniors who were not super happy about the change, because coach Grasty was a great coach, and it took a little time. We still won some games. I am looking for this group to take a couple of steps forward than last year. We did a lot more up-and-down pressing when I was the girl’s coach. On the boy’s side, we will do that, but do that more so in spots. These guys are really buying into the defensive part.

“We won 18 games. There is no doubt we had a talented team last year. What is frustrating is we could have done more. But we never really came together as a unit. I’m not used to losing that early in the playoffs.”

Marsh wants to play fast—and play great defense.

He will rely on three three-level scorers in returning 6-foot-4 senior guard Paul Glants, 5-11 senior guard Jake Manigault, and 5-8 sophomore guard Xander Grasty, the son of former coach Grasty. They will make Abington tough to defend. The Ghosts could have four point guards on the court at once in Glants, 5-7 junior guard Faizon Garland, grouped with Grasty and Manigault.

The inside work will need to be a team effort, led by Glants, and 6-5 senior Zion Hospedales. Depth will be provided by 6-1 junior Ray Rice and 5-11 senior guard Leo D’Arco.

One area this team will stress is togetherness.

That comes from a lesson learned.

“We were a team that had really good guys last year, and really good chemistry off the court, but not really good chemistry on the court,” Glants said. “We did not work well together. This team meshes well together. We are not filled with a bunch of seniors looking to score 1,000 points.

"If we play good, hard defense, and play hard, like we actually want to win, and not just score the ball -- if we do that, we are going to be okay. There was a case of selfishness last year. There were a bunch of egos. Checking egos is something we spoke about before last year, and it never happened. No one checked their egos.

“We cannot have any egos on this team because no one on this team played significant varsity minutes last year. Jake played a little varsity, and Xander played a little bit. But no one played much varsity to develop an ego. We all grew up together and we know we need to work hard to win.”

Marsh has put the responsibility on Manigault to be the face of the team. He lived through last season. He knows what needs to be done to create a new culture.

“It’s easy, make the extra pass, look for the open guy, but defense has to be our main focus,” Manigault said. “We aren’t very big. I do think we have the potential and the talent to be the No. 1 team in the SOL. We could do it. I learned a lot from last year. That will help us this year. I took a mental break and when I was ready to get back, I got back with my guys and we went right back to work. I did not have a voice last year. I’m ready to be that voice this year. I feel I can do it because of my work ethic and I’m willing to be a mentor to the younger guys.”

One of those younger guys who did some growing up last year was Xander Grasty. The son of a coach has some built-in advantages, and one of them is an advanced ability to see the court better than most his age. That was the case with Grasty.

“We didn’t play defense the way we could have, and a lot of that was from not talking and communicating like we should have,” Grasty said. “That changed already this summer. We also need to pick each other up more, which is also something we are already doing.”

Marsh has some high hopes for this season—and is well armed with the motivation of the early playoff loss.

“Don’t get me wrong, we had a great group of kids last year, and I know they will do well in whatever they do, they just didn’t communicate on the court together,” Marsh said. “We won’t have that problem this year. This team wanted ownership immediately after last season and they’re getting it.”

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Joseph Santoliquito is an award-winning sportswriter based in the Philadelphia area who began writing for CoBL in 2021 and is the president of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be followed on Twitter here.