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CR South gives Wright win in return to North

12/17/2016, 12:30am EST
By Josh Verlin

Austin Thomas (above) and Council Rock South beat North for the first time in five tries. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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The chants Derek Wright knew were coming started just before tipoff. A three-word phrase, repeated over and over, signifying the way the Council Rock North student section felt about its former coach.

“You’re a traitor” rang out across the North gymnasium, not for the only time of the evening.

They were directed at Wright, now head coach at archrival Council Rock South after a successful 14-year-run at North, his alma mater. And the younger brother of Villanova’s national-championship winning head coach -- “Jay Wright’s better” was another chant -- took it all in stride.

“I’d be disappointed if there weren’t any [chants],” Wright said. “That’s how it should be with high school sports. So it’s all good.”

Wright and his Golden Hawks had the last word in the first matchup of two this year, breaking a tie game in the fourth quarter to pull away for a 42-34 win.

The first-year South coach was more than happy to have it over with.

“I was not looking forward to it, just a very weird, uncomfortable feeling,” Wright said. “But...I knew this game was coming and I’m happy for our guys that they’re walking out of here feeling good about the result.”

He spent much of the days leading up to it trying to downplay the significance of this particular matchup, using the all-too-common mantra of “just another game.” That despite the fact that it was an intra-district rivalry game that also served as both teams’ Suburban One-National league opener. A rivalry that North had won the last four times, sweeping the matchups each of the last two seasons.

Plus, you know, that whole returning home thing for the coach.

So a senior-laden Council Rock South squad knew that it wasn’t quite any other game.

“A few of us talked about it yesterday, let’s try and get Coach Wright one,” senior guard Austin Thomas said. “We played for each other, that’s what we tried to do. We’re a family, we played for each other.

"It was definitely a big game for us.”

Thomas led the Golden Hawks (4-0, 1-0 SOL-National) with 12 points, and came up with arguably the two biggest plays in the win.

With just over three minutes remaining and South’s lead a scant two points, Thomas took a cross-court pass from classmate Kevin Newbert and buried an open left-wing triple to push the advantage to 31-26. Then, with the lead four and under 60 seconds to play, Council Rock South turned it over only -- for Thomas to immediately strip the North player and coast in for a layup, drawing a foul and completing the 3-point play.

“It was huge, and I didn’t even see it,” Wright lamented. “We were so bothered by whatever set we called, we just consistently did it wrong and North stole it and I was so upset I turned to our coaches to say we’ve got to do something else, and as that happened I saw Austin get the ball, I didn’t even see him steal it.”

Those buckets were part of a game-deciding 13-2 run by the Golden Hawks after the Indians had evened the game at 26 with five minutes remaining.


Alex Nordenholt (above) chipped in 10 points and five rebounds for Council Rock South. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

“We all knew that it’s not going to come down necessarily to execution, it’s going to be about the heart of the game," said senior guard Alex Nordenholt, who had 10 points in the win. "We want it more this year [than last year], we want to win this year, we have more heart."

Wright’s intra-district coaching move this offseason surprised those at his former program, who had revenge on their minds entering Friday night.

“We were upset,” North senior Ryan Costello said. “We weren’t happy that he left, but it’s alright. We like who we have now, we’ve moved on.”

Costello provided the majority of the offense, coming up with a career-best 18 points as the rest of his teammates combined for 16. The senior guard had 15 of his team’s 16 points in the second and third quarter, including all eight during a third period that saw North erase a four-point deficit and even things up at 22 going into the fourth.

But first-year head coach Jesse Krasna’s Indians couldn’t get the shots they wanted against an aggressive Hawks defensive unit down the stretch, falling to 1-3 (0-1 SOL-National).

“(We’re) going to work on a lot of things,” Costello said. “All of our problems are fixable, that’s a key part with us. There’s nothing we can’t fix and we’ll be ready next week.”

Holding North to 34 points represented yet another strong defensive effort for South. No opponent has scored more than 42 points so far against the Golden Hawks, who are giving up an average of 34.5 ppg through their first four games.

The commitment on that end of the floor has been thorough, from the starters through the reserves. In Friday night's win, South held North to 12-of-42 (28.6 percent) from the floor.

“We’re buying into defense," Thomas said. "Last year we put up 60-70 points; we can do that, but defense is big this year.”


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