Abington's Heath Surpasses 1,000-Point Milestone, Looks Toward Bigger Goals

Abington’s Robbie Heath is just the second junior in program history to surpass the 1,000-point milestone.

Abington’s Heath scores 1,000th career point, looks forward to bigger goals

By Jarrad Saffren 

Nobody realized it, not even Robbie Heath. 

Abington was pulling away from Penn Wood in the fourth quarter on February 24, in a District One Class 6A quarterfinal. 

Heath was scoring in bunches, like he usually does. 

After yet another basket, Abington’s resident historian/statistician Sam Szymanek started talking about Heath to his teammates, behind Heath’s back. 

“Sam told our guys that Robbie was two away, and I know it’s a cliche, but they love each other,” Abington coach Charles Grasty said. “They were like ‘Let’s play hard so we can get Robbie his thousand points.’ That had an impact.”

Moments later, Heath caught the ball on a fast break and dunked with two hands. Heath roared as he slammed the ball. A picture of the moment shows his eyebrows arched high, mouth wide open, teeth showing, long muscular, arms popping with bones and veins.

It was a triumphant, climactic moment. 

Heath finished with a team-high 21 points, reaching 1,001 for his career. He is just the second Abington junior to reach 1,000 career points. Richard Wright was the first, in 1973-74. He is also the second Heath to reach 1,000 career points at Abington. Robbie’s father—Bob “Tiger” Heath—reached 1,000 in 1982. 

“Robbie is unbelievable,” Szymanek said. “I’d put him in the Abington top 10.”

“Rob works his butt off,” Grasty said. “He came in as a freshman not knowing what to expect or do. He just listened to me, talked to me and kept getting better and better.”

Heath has had quite a three-year run at Abington. 

In 2014-15, he set a then-freshman record with 272 points. He also helped Abington win a District One Class 4A championship. 

In 2015-16, he averaged 10.5 points and led Abington to another league title. 

He also was an All-SOL National selection both years. 

But he raised his game to another level in 2016-17. Heath already has 466 points, a 16.6 average. He made the All-SOL National First Team for the second straight year and led Abington to its second district title in three years. Heath, Robert Young and Joseph O’Brien became the only Abington players to win two district championships. 

Heath has played his best in the biggest games. 

He dropped 17 in the second half of a January win that clinched the league title for Abington. He scored 30 in Abington’s SOL Tournament Championship win over Plymouth Whitemarsh. He dropped 30 in Abington’s district championship win over Coatesville on March 5. 

“He’s doing a lot more in Chuck’s offense,” Szymanek said. “Chuck wants him to have the ball late.”

Heath sank 43 3-pointers as a freshman, and just 22 this year. That sounds like a regression. But it actually explains Heath’s scoring bump. 

The speedy guard is driving a lot more than he did. 

“He’s really athletic,” O’Brien said. “He gets to the hole nice, finishes and that creates opportunities for me and Eric (Dixon) down low.”

“Coach said I had to be aggressive. So I’ve just been attacking the basket right from the rip,” Heath said. “I feel like I can beat any defender one-on-one.”

It helps that Heath is shooting 81 percent from the foul line, and that’s not a fluky number. He is 136-of-166, 28 more made free throws than a year ago. 

Despite his success, Heath has not generated all that much college attention. None had offered scholarships as recently as mid-February.

Colleges often discover players during the spring and summer AAU seasons. 

And Heath plans to play AAU ball this spring and summer, which he didn’t the last two years. 

“Staying here for AAU will help me in the long run,” Heath said. “This was the plan since eighth grade.” 

But before all that, Heath hopes to lead Abington to its first state title since 1974-75, Wright’s senior season. They already have one milestone in common. There is a real chance that, two weeks from now, they could share another. 

Abington is the top seed from District One in the PIAA Class 6A Tournament. They are 6-2 against other teams in the tournament.

Abington plays Central Dauphin East Saturday at 4 p.m. 

Heath no doubt realizes what he’s on the verge of this time. 

“Our goals were to win the league, Suburban, districts and states,” Heath said. 

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