City of Basketball Love

By Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue)
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ARDMORE — Sam’i Singletary was restless Friday night. 

On Saturday awaited an opportunity he’d been looking forward to for a long, long time.

Singletary, who has been in the Lower Merion school district since fourth grade, wasn’t aware of the rich basketball history at his future high school growing up. But as a part of the Aces program over the last four years, his ambitions to leave his mark on the program grew..

Over the course of the offseason, the senior finally carved out a role for himself, earning a spot in the starting lineup for the reigning District 1 champions’ season opener against Upper Dublin on Saturday. He didn’t waste time making a name for himself, scoring a game-high 26 points to lead an 82-68 Lower Merion win.

“I can’t even believe this right now,” Singletary said. “I’m just grateful for my teammates, my coaching staff for preparing us for these games. For the last six months, we’ve been preparing for this day. I’ve been thinking about this day my whole life, and couldn't even sleep last night. My whole life I’ve been thinking about it, so I’m just grateful for all my coaches and everybody who’s been there for me.”

Lower Merion went into last season without some of the typical Division I talent (i.e. Jack Forrest, Demetrius Lilley, Sam Brown) the program has become synonymous with, instead relying on a senior core made of players with little to no varsity experience. That group propelled the Aces to a Central League and the program’s third District 1 Class 6A title in four years.

It’s a similar formula this season with seniors Singletary, Rashyne Patterson and Tate Perkins — who saw very little game action last season — starting on Saturday alongside classmates Gus Wright and Carson Kasmer, a Gettysburg commit who is the team’s lone returning starter. Senior Lamont Grier is another new name who was the first player off the bench.

The Aces got all their points from their seniors. Kasmer followed Singletary with 23 points, Perkins had 12 and Patterson (9), Grier (8) and Wright (4) rounded out the LM scoring.

“That slogan, ‘The tradition never graduates,’ we don’t often talk about that, but these kids have been through the hard practices,” Lower Merion 35-year coach Gregg Downer said. “They’ve been through the weight training, they’ve been through the scouting reports and quite often they’re ready.”

“All these guys have just been through the system,” Kasmer said. “They know what it means to be an Ace and it’s great for them to finally showcase what they have and it’s awesome.”

Perkins got Lower Merion going on Saturday, scoring nine of his 12 points in the first period as the Aces grabbed a 19-11 lead after one. Kasmer dropped in 12 in the second period as LM grew its lead as large as 18 before taking a 37-24 lead into the break.

Upper Dublin star senior Ryan Mulroy went scoreless in the first half before finally making his first bucket a minute and a half into the third. He finished with 20 points in the final two periods to lead the Cardinals with junior Noah Cohen adding 18 (five 3s). However, Lower Merion had its answer in Singletary, who had 19 in the second half.

“Rinse, lather, repeat, right? Whole new team and they’ve still got it,” Upper Dublin coach Derek Brooks said of Lower Merion. “We watched some fall game stuff … which helped us a lot, they didn’t do anything that surprised us. … But they’re good, they’re strong, it’s five seniors that started for them, they knew how to play, they’re disciplined. Hat tip to them, and they looked like they were honestly, they were moving a little quicker than us. Their conditioning might be a little better.”

Upper Dublin is coming off an SOL Tournament title and District 1 Class 5A championship appearance last season and showed what it capable of by giving the Aces a scare down the stretch.

The Cardinals closed the gap to single digits, 54-45, entering the third quarter and got as tight as 61-55 with 3:35 left in the game. Singletary hit a pair of of corner triples on back-to-back possessions to put the Aces back up 12 about a minute later, helping ice the game.

The two main things he worked on this offseason were his body and his 3-point shooting. He finished with six 3-point makes in the game, including five in the second half.

“He’s got a lot of talent,” Downer said. “Like one of many juniors that kind of get log jammed in our system, he’s been waiting his turn. He really didn’t play substantially much last year, but he did have a very good offseason. I think he’s a surefire Division III prospect and that game was getting kind of tight there and he made two big threes to give us some breathing room. He was very good.”

Adam Herrenkohl was one of the Aces’ success stories from last year’s team, going from a player who was cut from the program as a sophomore to an all-league talent. Singletary said that gave himself and others optimism as they waited their turn. Kasmer noted Singletary’s spirits were always high last season both on the bench during games.

It might not be Singletary’s night every night as the ball swings around the offense to Kasmer, Perkins, Patterson, Grier, Wright and others, but he’s excited to finally get his chance to shine.

“As one of the bottom seven, I went up, I went down throughout the season, which ws mentally challenging for me, but I just stuck with it,” Singletary said. “I just didn’t give up and trusted the process and the coaching staff.”

“No matter how hard it got inside of basketball, outside of basketball, this is a great community and I just love the people around here. They just make me feel home.”

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By Quarter
Upper Dublin  11 | 13 | 21 | 23 | |  68
Lower Merion 19 | 18 | 17 | 28 | |  82

Scoring
Upper Dublin: Ryan Mulroy 20, Noah Cohen 18, Justin Ragsdale 11, James Castronuovo 7, Kobe Bazemore 5, Idris Rines 5, Horace Jackson IV 2.

Lower Merion: Sam’i Singletary 26, Carson Kasmer 23, Tate Perkins 12, Rashyne Patterson 9, Lamont Grier 8, Gus Wright 4.