City of Basketball Love

Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3)
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LEVITTOWN >> It was a precursor of good things to come.

Conwell-Egan girls’ basketball ends every practice with a halfcourt shooting game and in their last session before the start of the season, sophomore Brianna Jackson walked it off on a make. Cut to Friday night in the waning seconds of the third quarter and Jackson was at it again, banking in a heave at the horn to give the Eagles a spark.

Jackson had a hand in a couple key plays as Conwell-Egan rallied past then outlasted Pennsbury 29-27 to win its opener.

“I think it really helped, everyone got pretty hyped and it showed,” Jackson said. “We do them after practice every day but I’ve also done a couple in games.”

Friday marked the season debut for a pair of new-look teams, the Falcons revamping after losing several multi-year varsity contributors and the host Eagles running out their young flotilla of guards around senior Lily Milewski. Points didn’t come easily for either team, which is what CEC coach Chris Brennan was expecting but he wanted to see how his team dealt with a more deliberate game.

There were a couple big shots, like Jackson’s half-court bomb or the go-ahead three by Ariella Parks that Jackson assisted in the fourth quarter, but largely it was a game won by the Eagles’ defense. Even the last play of the game was a stop, sophomore Jayla Butler dislodging the ball on a drive with Jackson recovering it at the buzzer.

“We don’t always talk on defense but as soon as we went on the other side of the court (after halftime), he said he wouldn’t be there to help us anymore so we took it into our own hands,” Jackson said. “We started talking on defense and that gave us momentum.”

Pennsbury led 7-5 after one thanks to the first varsity basket by freshman Alyssa Thomas - a three - then rallied out of a 14-10 deficit going into the half when senior Ava Jordan knocked down a pair of threes off Thomas assists. Jordan and sophomore Sammie Haws paced the Falcons with eight points each while Thomas had seven in her debut.

It looked like Conwell-Egan was going to have to dig out of a five-point hole to start the fourth before Jackson’s halfcourt look banked in. It was a slow crawl back, but when Jackson spotted Parks open in the right corner, she didn’t hesitate to make the pass.

“I always try to look for my teammates before I look for myself,” Jackson said.

Brennan was happy with the way his team handled the game, especially with Pennsbury making it difficult for Milewski to get anything going inside. The senior Bloomsburg recruit finished with five points, nine rebounds and two assists but it was her young teammates who led the charge paced by Jackson’s nine and Butler’s eight points.

“We drilled for it, we had the kids go through a two-minute possession on defense knowing they’ll wait for the right shot,” Brennan said. “To sustain that for that long a time, it’s hard and I think the girls really responded.”

The Eagles convened at halftime, talked out a few things that had burned them defensively then left it up to the players to get it done on that end. Conwell-Egan wasn’t looking any further beyond Friday night’s game, the same they’ll do Saturday against CR South, but Brennan didn’t hesitate to say the result was a good one for this team’s confidence early on.

“We’re all there for each other,” Jackson said. “We’re all going to help each other. We talked it out, came out in the second half and did a lot better.”

CONWELL-EGAN 5 | 9 | 9 | 6 - 29

PENNSBURY 7 | 9 | 9 | 2 - 27

CE: Brianna Jackson 9, Jayla Butler 8, Lily Milewski 5, Ariella Parks 4, Olivia Dittman 2, Olvia Dellavecchio 1

P: Sammie Haws 8, Ava Jordan 8, Alyssa Thomas 7, Maggie Burns 2, Emily Panaro 1, Bella Stewart 1

LANSDALE CATHOLIC 45, COUNCIL ROCK SOUTH 23

A fair grade for the Crusaders season debut Friday would be “passing, but incomplete.”

Taking the court for first time in an official capacity since Tom Lonergan took over the program last month, Lansdale Catholic at times looked like a team sure in what it was doing and others like a team still trying to learn a whole lot of new information. Nobody was expecting it all to come together in just a couple weeks but the Crusaders figured it out well enough on Friday.

A win’s a win and LC will take its 45-23 victory over Council Rock South with the knowledge there’s still plenty of work to do.

“It’s all part of the process with a new coach and not a lot of time to prepare,” LC senior Nadia Yemola said. “We’re going to be a little rocky at first, but I definitely think we did a good job preparing for this game. There’s ups and downs but he was coaching us through it the entire time.”

LC started the season without senior Sanyiah Littlejohn, the guard still on the mend from an offseason shoulder issue, then spent much of the game without senior Grace McDonough on the floor thanks to foul trouble against the 6-foot-2 forward. The Crusaders believe they have a deeper team this year and that notion was put to the test early.

Sophomore Ali Kaltenbacher, who came over from Gwynedd Mercy Academy in the summer, did her thing with eight points, 12 rebounds and two assists to help offset McDonough’s limited minutes on the glass. Freshman Lily Clair also gave the team a boost in her debut, the guard connecting on her first three shots for eight points in the first quarter.

“Lily Clair hit some big threes for us and that was really big, we didn’t know which way it was going to head,” Lonergan said. “She came in and proved that she should be out there. She didn’t play like a freshman, she played with a lot of poise and took her shots.”

While the Crusaders got enough offensively, paced by 11 points from Yemola, it was their defense that commanded a first quarter that saw them lead 14-3 and exit the half with a 24-5 advantage. It was an overall rough night offensively for the Golden Hawks, who played their first game with Steve Polinsky as head coach, but a 1-of-19 first half made it an especially difficult hill to climb back up.

Senior Lil Metrick led the Golden Hawks with 10 points, who had a key player of their own in foul trouble as point guard Kathryn O’Kane had to fight the whistle all game. LC’s size and length did cause their share of problems, but the Hawks did get good looks that they’ll often make that opted not to go down on Friday.

“We’re pleased for a first time out and going against a team we knew had a lot of different scorers,” Lonergan said. “We did a really good job of using our length to keep them in front of us and contest their shots. I thought we overall controlled both ends of the floor and the glass.”

Yemola, a Kutztown recruit, did all her damage in the second and third quarters while also doling out four assists. McDonough, despite shuffling in and out to keep her from further foul trouble, still tallied 10 points.

While there were times where the Crusaders got a little stuck trying to run their new offenses, Yemola said the coaches told them to just go with the flow if they were unsure. All but one of LC’s second half baskets was assisted, as the team started to find a little traction within their sets

“We wanted to get more touches on the ball and start reversing it in our offense,” Yemola said. “Our coaches always say the first shot in the offense, you’re not going to get that a lot, so it takes a couple times running it through.”

LC returns to action Saturday against Pennsbury. The Crusaders don’t expect to be a finished product by the end of the season’s first weekend, but they were plenty glad to get the first game out of the way with a win.

“I thought we played pretty well, obviously there were some rocky moments but we’re working through it,” Yemola said. “We’re excited to get back to it.”

LANSDALE CATHOLIC 14 | 10 | 13 | 8 || 45

COUNCIL ROCK SOUTH 3 | 2 | 7 | 11 || 23

LC: Nadia Yemola 11, Grace McDonough 10, Lily Clair 8, Ali Kaltenbacher 8, Allie Esposito 6, Aubrey Mobley 2

CRS: Lil Metrick 10, Kathryn O’Kane 5, Fiona Reckner 5, Annabel Kushch 2, Bella Hettler 1