City of Basketball Love

Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3)
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WYNDMOOR >> Archbishop Carroll just had to let it all out.

After giving up a big second half lead and losing to Archbishop Ryan in overtime on Wednesday for a third straight loss in the Philadelphia Catholic League, the Patriots took it out on each other in a focused and physical practice Thursday. The shared pain turned into shared wealth on Friday as Carroll went on the road to La Salle, set the tone and shot the lights out.

An energized, connected effort combined with a barrage of threes aided the Patriots in an 80-66 win over the Explorers for their first PCL victory.

“Sometimes, you want to get anger out and get aggression out and I think we competed, used our legs, used our bodies, walled up and had a physical practice,” Carroll coach Francis Bowe said. “Nothing got out of control, these kids are mature enough to understand that we’re not doing this to hurt anybody, but we need to rewire our brains and get back to where we were at 4-0 and looking really good.”

If there were any concerns about lingering effects from Wednesday’s collapse, Nasir Ralls erased them in the first eight minutes Friday. The dynamic junior guard was locked-in defensively and somehow more so offensively as he led Carroll’s scorching shooting with 22 points including a 6-of-9 showing from deep.

Ralls hit his four shots, all threes, for a 12-point first quarter and despite a couple highlight dunks from La Salle’s Joey O’Brien sparking the Explorers to a 15-15 tie at the end of the frame, Carroll was feeling it. The threes didn’t stop, the Patriots sinking 14-of-29 from deep as a group sparked by Ralls and Christian Matos, who was 5-of-9 from long range.

Friday, in Ralls’ estimation, was the team’s first collectively strong shooting performance of the season. Munir Greig, who made 2-of-5 from deep, added 20 points and Matos poured in 15 with all his production coming behind the arc.

“I was telling my teammates to let it go with confidence,” Ralls said. “If you’re gonna shoot it, shoot it but let it go with confidence.

“It was us doing what we do best, getting downhill and creating for each other.”

Life in the PCL is unforgiving. So even with Ian Williams and Drew Corrao sidelined with injuries, the games were still coming fast and furious for the Patriots and nobody was going to ease up just because they had some starters out.

Bowe, his staff and his players knew this, but it still wears on a team to have to compete with a couple mainstay players on the bench in a leg brace and a boot. Freshman Yasir Turner and junior Chris Kingkiner have been asked to fill in, Turner contributing 12 points off the bench and Kingkiner - who played against one of his best friends in O’Brien -  with plenty of activity helping to set the defensive tone.

“Weather the storm for sure,” Bowe said. “Guys minutes had to go up. I’m not saying it wasn’t part of the plan but you from X amount to minutes to now we’re doubling them and oh, by the way, let’s learn on the fly with a national schedule then let’s start (the PCL) with Roman.

“It’s nice we were able to collectively put four quarters together and pull this one out.” 

At seemingly every stoppage, Patriots players came together for a quick word or two just to stay connected and they were playing free. Bowe said he could tell the group was focused from the warm-up, something that hasn’t necessarily been the case in every game this season and part of what had cost the Patriots in their first three Catholic League games.

“We were just trying to go out and get a win,” Ralls said. “I tried to keep my team focused, I told them to lock in and if we stayed focused, we got this.

“It was just talking and communicating. I try to pride myself on defense, taking the big matchups, that’s what I’m here for.”

While Archbishop Carroll got its first breakthrough, La Salle is now the team facing the unrelenting grind of the PCL schedule. The Explorers fell to 2-2 in the league, dropping two in a row this week to Bonner-Prendergast and the Patriots.

La Salle seemed a bit jumpy early on, experienced players fumbling passes or throwing the ball away on early possessions and the entire team finding offense hard to come by against Carroll’s antagonizing defense. Add that to a cadre of Patriots shooters who were getting open looks and not missing them and it accumulated into a difficult climb once Carroll started to open things up in the second quarter.

The Explorers fell behind 29-17 in the second quarter on a take by Luca Foster with 2:23 left in the half but La Salle did fight back with a 9-1 run and got within four at 30-26 on a putback by Nick Neri with 13.2 on the clock. Neri worked hard all night, getting six of his eight rebounds on the offensive glass and leading the Explorers with 19 points.

Second year La Salle coach Ryan Ansel felt like Friday’s game was played at Carroll’s tempo, the Explorers’ boss calling it a “race to 78,” citing the Patriots’ scoring average this season. For his team, it’s a simple solution if it wants to end a two-game slide.

“Just do what we did to be successful,” Ansel said. “We were playing for each other, we were playing together, we were making our defense lead to offense. Both the Neumann-Goretti and the (Archbishop) Ryan games, we came in with great energy and in attack mode, where this game, we felt like we were on our heels.
“We couldn’t catch the ball, we couldn’t dribble the ball, we have to figure that out and execute.”

Greig hit a buzzer-beating three at the halftime horn for a 33-26 lead. Carroll scored the first five points of the third quarter and twice had the lead at 14 points in the frame. The fourth quarter saw a lot of free throws, but Foster did put a cap on it with a late dunk.

Archbishop Carroll just needed to let some things out. The Patriots did just that, then they got to make someone else feel what they’ve been feeling the last three games.

“Great practice (Thursday), it was a dogfight practice,” Ralls said. “That’s what we’re here for.”

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By Quarter
Carroll: 15 | 18 | 24 | 23 || 80

La Salle: 15 | 11 | 20 | 20 ||  66

Scoring
AC: Nasir Ralls 22, Munir Greig 20, Christian Matos 15, Yasir Turner 12, Luca Foster 8, Chris Kingkiner 3

L: Nick Neri 19, Max Okebata 17, Nick Parisi 14, Joey O’Brien 8, Grayson McKeough 5, Brayden Erfle 3