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Holbrook and Taylor on the verge of ending careers as champions

03/20/2015, 5:00pm EDT
By Aron Minkoff

Roman Coach Chris McNesby has a chance to be first coach in school history to win PIAA Crown

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Aron Minkoff (@AronMinkoff)

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With one game left in the 2014-15 high school basketball season, one of the most storied Philadelphia basketball programs finds itself playing for its first state championship.

Roman Catholic, located near the heart of Philadelphia at the intersection of Broad and Vine, has had its share of 1,000-point scorers, has won the most Philadelphia Catholic League titles of any school (29)–but has never won a PIAA championship.

Tomorrow’s game against Martin Luther King will be the Cahillites first-ever title appearance in Hershey, seven years after the Catholic League joined the PIAA full-time.

After already breaking Neumann-Goretti’s streak of six straight PCL crowns just a few weeks ago, this Roman team finds themselves a game away from a place in history. That message is not lost on the team’s seniors Manny Taylor and Gemil Holbrook who cannot see anything other than opportunity as their high school careers are almost finished.

“The thing driving me is not only is this my last high school basketball game,” Taylor said. “This is my last basketball game every since I’ll be playing football next year. I only have one more practice left, only have four quarters left in my career. I am not taking anything for granted, I am going to give it my all and leave with no regrets.”

Taylor who will play football next year for Rutgers has had an incredible season when it is put into perspective. The 6-foot-5 big man lost his starting spot in favor of 6-7 junior Paul Newman, but that did not stop him.

If anything, it seemed to make him a better player as he shined on the biggest stage, in the PCL playoffs at the Palestra. Taylor erupted for 10 points and nine rebounds in the semifinals and has been on a tear since, playing like a guy who does not want his career to end.

The team has a relatively young nucleus with players like junior Nazeer Bostick, sophomore D’Andre Vilmar and Newman. Newman has been forced into the rotation and ultimately the starting spot when senior TreVaughn Wilkerson tore his meniscus at the start of the season.

Wilkerson’s injury also forced Taylor and Holbrook to take more of a leadership role with the team.

“They both have sacrificed a lot,” Roman coach Chris McNesby said of his two healthy seniors. “They have learned how to be senior and what it takes to be a leader. With Manny coming and taking that sixth-man role all year round. Gemil is a scorer, but he learned that its not all about scoring, you have to get your teammates involved. It has been cool for me as a coach to see them mature and grow young men.”

Holbrook, a 6-5 wing, is moving on to play basketball at Rider next year but has been confident about his team’s chances all season. After the Cahillites won the Catholic League championship, Holbrook was not shy when he asked how his team was going to do in the state playoffs adding “we are going to make a deep run in that, too.”

Holbrook knows the legacy that he could leave at Roman and added that winning a state title is “important to me. It is something that I never did and something I want to and this is my last chance to do it.”

In this year’s District 12 AAAA City Title game, it was Roman escaping with a 58-57 victory over King back on February 28. McNesby expects that the rematch will be much of the same.

“They are really tough group, tougher than any group we played all year,” McNesby said. “We have to match their  toughness, they attack the glass and rebound well. They make you pay when you take bad shots, and we have to play a clean fundamental game against them.”

King is not going to just lie down and let Roman walk to the AAAA championship. They are looking to make history themselves, as they too are in search of their first PIAA crown.

After winning the Public League last year, they lost in the semifinals this year to eventual champions Imhotep and have been playing like a team with something left to prove as they have dominated everything in their path. The Cougars have beat their opponents by an average score of 18.8 ppg, with the closest game being their 48-35 semifinal victory over Pittsburgh’s Taylor Allderdice HS.

With a core of seniors led by Sammy Foreman, Ladji Fofana and Tyheem Harmon in the backcourt, Sean Colson has a dangerous group that could very well emerge victorious at the GIANT Center after things are said and done.

“They are winners,” McNesby said. “They won the Pub last year and they are proven winners. Most of their core from that Pub championship team is back; in their mind they could’ve gone further in the Pub playoffs [this year] than they did, but they have really challenged themselves in these state playoffs and it shows.”

For McNesby though, he has a chance to be the first coach in Roman history to win a state title. Being a former player at Roman and now the coach he is a “Roman man” just as Jim Harbaugh is a “Michigan man.”

“It would be special [to win the PIAA], but I am trying not to think about it too much,” McNesby said. “It makes you anxious, just looking at it as a game, it would be awesome for the school and the alumni. Obviously the piaa has such history and to have Roman be a part of that would really special for me.”

Even though the team is senior laden, it has been junior Tony Carr who has unselfishly led the team all season long at point guard. Carr has meant everything to Roman this season and at no point has his unselfish attitude changed.

As his team celebrated winning the PCL crown together at midcourt, it was Carr who ran across the Palestra floor nearly tacking McNesby as the two embraced and celebrated.

“I am never self-centered, I think about it being more important to us as a team,” Carr said. “Especially for coach McNesby to be the first coach to win state, would mean so much to me to get it done for him.”

The unselfish attitude has rubbed off on his teammates and they are truly on the verge of capping off what has already been a special season confirming something that they already believe, they are the best in the state.


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