City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Derrick Morton-Rivera was asleep on the Father Judge bus when he was awoken by the feeling of the tires going over the rumble stripes on the side of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. By the time he’d fully woken up, the bus was stopped on the shoulder, only about 15 minutes from Norristown High School and a PIAA 6A semifinal against Imhotep Charter — if they had a working ride.

“The bus turned off, and they kept trying to get the bus to turn back on,” Morton-Rivera said. “We were sitting there for like 15 minutes and then our coaches came and we had to get in a car — me and Kevair were in the trunk of a car.”

Judge head coach Chris Roantree, just ahead of the bus, had to get off at Plymouth Meeting, get back on the turnpike, drive to the Fort Washington exit, then get back on the turnpike coming east. By the time he reached his team, several other assistant coaches and parents who had been behind the Crusader bus had stopped to pull over, loading the team into their cars. 

Roantree, thanking the fact he drives an Escalade, ended up with Morton-Rivera and Kevair Kennedy and a few others all piled into the various rows and spaces. The irony wasn’t lost on the Judge coach, whose players typically drive themselves and teammates to their various area games. 

“We don’t usually take a bus,” Roantree said with a laugh.

Judge’s delayed arrival to Norristown resulted in a delayed tip-off by 25 minutes and then a slow one on the court for the Crusaders, the Panthers jumping out to an early big lead in the third matchup of the year between the two powerhouses. But behind Morton-Rivera’s sharpshooting and a standout all-around game from Kennedy, Father Judge kept its first-ever run in the state playoffs going all the way to Hershey, overcoming a standout game from Imhotep junior R.J. Smith to pull out a 69-58 win Saturday afternoon. 

“I said to them after the game, there’s only 12 boys teams that know the finality of their season now and it’s a great opportunity for us to make history from a school’s perspective,” Roantree said. “We’re excited.”

Morton Rivera, one of five Division I recruits in the Judge starting lineup, hit six 3-pointers and finished with 20 points. Kennedy, another first team All-Catholic honoree, finished with 13 points, eight assists and six rebounds. Sophomore Naz Tyler added 14 points and six rebounds, with center Everett Barnes (Loyola Md.) and junior Rocco Westfield adding eight apiece.

The win continues the best season in Judge history in terms of postseason success. The Crusaders had never been to the PIAA playoffs before this year, always stuck behind two of the other high-level big-school programs (Roman, La Salle, Prep, etc.) in the league’s District 12 slots and kept on the sideline in March.

But they’re battled-tested now, Roantree’s squad shaking off a rough start to play three-and-a-half quarters of top-notch hoops at both ends. The game was the rubber match between the two powerhouses, Judge beating Imhotep by two at Arcadia in December and Imhotep returning the favor in the District 12 championship on Feb. 28, overcoming a 16-point second-half deficit for a four-point win.

“Our guys were locked in and focused,” Roantree said. “We talked all week it’s not about revenge, it’s about getting one more to play together, and that’s what we get them.”

“We always talk about getting one more,” Morton-Rivera added. “We have all these seniors on the team that contribute a lot, and we definitely want to keep playing with them, so this one last game would mean a lot to us.”

The loss was Imhotep’s first in a state playoff game since one to Neumann-Goretti in the 2016 state semifinals, the two meeting up in the final year of the old AAA classification, before the state switched from four to six classes. The Panthers had won 35 straight state playoff games since then, including six titles (2017-19, 2022-24) and two games in 2020 before the pandemic. 

But this year’s group had a rough go, with Zaahir Muhammad-Gray suffering a significant leg injury in early December, right before Zion Green transferred to Camden (N.J.), taking two big-time Division I prospects out of the Imhotep roster. The Panthers played three freshmen in Saturday’s loss, starting just one senior in Carnell Henderson, and they didn’t have enough shot-makers or stops down the stretch to keep up.

“The adversity that this team has faced, to win our league championship, to win a true city championship,” 24th-year head coach Andre Noble said, “I’m just proud of those guys, they’re selfless and give everything they tried to give for the team. I appreciate them, as a staff, we really appreciate how hard they worked.”

Smith, Imhotep’s outstanding 5-9 junior guard, shined in a 31-point outing, hitting five 3-pointers and going 12-of-19 from the floor while grabbing five rebounds, dishing out four assists and grabbing three steals. He hit one tough shot after another — baseline pull-ups, reverse layups, 3-pointer where he split two defenders and buried them. 

“I said to him after the game, ‘I don’t even know how to guard you after the last couple of games,’” Roantree said of the Division I recruit, who scored 11 fourth-quarter points in the Imhotep comeback a few weeks ago. “Tip of the cap to him.”

It’ll be an all-Catholic League PIAA boys’ 6A championship game at the GIANT Center next Saturday night at 8 PM, Judge taking on Roman Catholic in a rematch of the 2025 Philadelphia Catholic League title game. The Crusaders won that one 41-34 after falling behind 10-2 after one quarter, an experience that paid off after another slow start Saturday.

Imhotep Charter had all the early momentum, eight unanswered points out of the gate forcing a Roantree timeout less than two minutes in. That didn’t stop the Panthers — Smith hit a couple 3-pointers in the next few minutes and assisted on two others as Imhotep pushed its lead to 21-6 with three minutes left in the opening period. 

That was as wide as the gap got. 

Senior wing Kevin Beck came in at the end of the quarter and found junior Max Moshinski for a couple layups to end the quarter with Judge down 11. They quickly got the gap inside single digits with a Morton-Rivera 3-pointer, and the junior wing was just getting going. 

Morton-Rivera put the Crusaders up for the first time, 30-28, on a transition 3-pointer — his fourth of the period, on four attempts — with just over two minutes left in the half.

“When we came out the second quarter, we’ve been in that situation before,especially down at the Palestra, we came out slow and couldn’t get the ball to go in the rim,” Morton-Rivera said. “I think it took two [3-pointers to feel hot], Because the next time I got it, it just felt good every time I shot the ball.”

Judge turned its 33-30 halftime lead into a 47-40 one after three quarters, getting an alley-oop slam and a 3-pointer by Westfield and a couple driving buckets by Kennedy in the period. 

Imhotep, as expected, never folded. The Panthers made it a four-point game early in the fourth quarter on a Henderson 3-pointer. But Judge had a response every time: that shot was met with a Moshinski alley-oop which helped push the lead almost immediately back to nine with 5:21 to play. 

Morton-Rivera’s sixth 3-pointer of the night was an early dagger, putting the Crusaders up double figures with four minutes left. Smith led one final push, hitting an off-balance 3-pointer and getting fouled on another, his two free-throws cutting it to 58-55. 

But the Crusaders sealed it at the line, mostly in the form of sophomore Naz Tyler, who went 8-of-10 on free throws in the game’s final two minutes while Imhotep came up empty on several ensuing possessions. 

Now they’ll have a week to prepare for a third matchup with the Cahillites, against whom they already have two wins this season. Roman has five state titles to its name, most recently in 2022, and lost in the state title game in 2023. 

“We know Roman’s going to come after beating them twice this year,” Roantree said. “Chris is a great coach, he’s going to make a lot of adjustments, we’ve just got to make adjustments. It’ll be a great battle there, we’ve been two of the top teams in the state all year, and to end up there and one more time after the PCL championship, it’s going to be a great matchup.”

By Quarter
IC:  21  |  10  |  10  |  18  ||  58
FJ:  10  |  23  |  14  |  22  ||  69

Shooting
IC: 22-49 FG (11-26 3PT), 3-7 FT
FJ: 21-42 FG (9-19 3PT), 18-25 FT

Scoring
IC: RJ Smith 31, Latief Lorenzano-White 10, Carnell Henderson 9, Kevin Benson III 3, Ian Smith 3, Rocky Johnson 2

FJ: Derrick Morton-Rivera 20, Naz Tyler 14, Kevair Kennedy 13, Rocco Westfield 8, Everett Barnes 8, Max Moshinski 6