City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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In order for Lower Merion to get back to the District 1 6A semifinals -- and thus earn a trip to Temple University’s spacious Liacouras Center -- the third-seeded Aces needed to get through sixth-seeded Pennridge on Friday night.

And for Gregg Downer’s squad to get past Dean Behrens’ visitors to the Kobe Bryant Gymnasium, that meant shutting down the Rams’ star junior guard Sean Yoder.

Fortunately for Downer, he has junior guard Darryl Taylor, a two-year starter and the team’s defensive specialist.

It’s a role Taylor has happily played since his days in middle school hoops,

“I like being the defensive stopper,” the 5-foot-11, 160-pound guard said. “[It] gets my teammates going.”

Taylor performed his job to perfection, keeping Yoder under tight watch all night long, while also chipping into a hot-shooting showing by Lower Merion in an impressive 63-39 win at Kobe Bryant Gymnasium.

Pennridge was absolutely suffocated by its hosts’ defense, making only four shots in the first half on 25 attempts, by which point Lower Merion already had a 28-14 lead. Taylor -- with a good amount of help from classmate Steve Payne -- locked down Yoder, holding the Division I recruit without a point on six first-half shots.

“Darryl (and) Steve, they both have taken on so many assignments...they’re used to the big challenge,” Downer said. “This was just one of many challenges, and they know that they’re our defensive stoppers.”

Yoder finished with only three points, but nobody on the Rams -- save for senior forward Tyrese Lewis, who had 16 points and 10 rebounds -- had their shots falling. Pennridge was just 1-of-13 from 3-point range through the first three quarters, before finally making three in the fourth after the game was well out of the reach.

Lower Merion’s pressure defense had a big hand in that, forcing 12 turnovers on the evening. Taylor came away with four steals of his own, including two in a row with three minutes left in the third quarter before immediately helping force a 10-second call.

By that point, the Aces were already up 20, and they didn’t stop there, continuing to push the pace and bomb 3s until the final two minutes.

As cold as Pennridge (18-7) was from the floor, Lower Merion was hot, knocking down six 3-pointers in the first half alone and 10 for the game -- on 25 attempts, though the Aces’ starters were 10-for-17 from deep.

“Boy, the rims seemed tight for us, and it was like the ocean for them,” Behrens said. “They shot the ball extremely well...I thought we came out in the third quarter, had some good passes, had a couple good shots, and they come out and hit two 3s, and I’m like ‘gee whiz.’”

“You never expect a game to be that lopsided, but sometimes it happens, and we were shooting a hot ball and they were shooting a cold ball,” Downer said. “Got off to that 11-2 lead, and sometimes that’s just regular ebb-and-flow of a game, but...we never looked back.”

Payne paced Lower Merion (22-4) with 21 points, grabbing nine rebounds and dishing out three assists as the Rams had trouble keeping the 6-1 guard in front of them. Jack Forrest, one of the other of Downer’s cadre of juniors, had 19 points, five rebounds, five assists and two steals; senior Harrison Klevan had three 3-pointers for his 11 points.

Even Taylor, not typically one of Lower Merion’s best outside shooters, got in on the action, knocking down two first-half 3-pointers on three attempts; he finished with eight points, four steals and three assists.

“Darryl’s kind of the x-factor with the 3s,” Downer said. “He’s hot or cold from 3, and he made a couple, that was very helpful...he had a third one that kind of popped out on him. So hopefully he can keep doing that moving forward.”

The win earns Lower Merion a trip to Liacouras after missing out a year ago, when the Aces lost in the district’s second round and had to win three straight in play-backs just to reach the PIAA state playoffs.

Pennridge goes into two seeding games, first playing No. 7 seed Norristown next Tuesday night; No. 5 Coatesville and No. 8 Upper Darby will meet in the other.

All of the juniors on the Aces’ varsity roster were present two years ago, soaking in the atmosphere at the 10,000-plus seat arena on North Broad St., when Lower Merion lost to Plymouth-Whitemarsh in the semifinals, the first of three straight losses to end the 2015-16 season, including a first-round defeat in the state playoffs.

They’re certainly hoping the return visit turns out better, though they’ll have to deal with high-major forward recruit Eric Dixon and No. 3-seed Abington, which dispatched Norristown 57-43 on Friday evening. Either P-W or Central Bucks West will await in either the championship game or the consolation one.

“As freshmen, it was a learning experience,” Taylor said. “Now it’s our time to shine.”