Abington defeated PW in Friday night’s District One AAAA title game at Temple University. Check back for photos of all the action; click here or any photo for direct link to gallery.
By Scott Huff
Philadelphia – The last time that Abington head coach Charles Grasty saw the Ghosts win a PIAA District One title was in 1986 when a young Chuck Grasty was an eighth grader at Abington Junior High School.
The second time Grasty watched his beloved Ghosts capture a PIAA District One championship was Friday night at Temple University as the # 6 seeded Ghosts dominated # 4 seed Plymouth Whitemarsh 53-35 to earn still another piece of hardware for the Abington trophy case.
The Ghosts have won the Suburban One League National Conference title, the SOL Championship tournament and the District One title so far in 2015.
“I just wanted to sit down and enjoy the moment in the fourth quarter,” said a smiling Grasty who graduated from Abington in 1990. “It feels great to be a part of this – although I tell the players all the time I would rather be a player playing in these games than a coach coaching in these games.
“I hope we are getting some of the respect that these kids deserve,” added Grasty. “We go out to play hard – and win.”
Plymouth Whitemarsh head coach Jim Donofrio more than paid his respects to the new District One champions.
“Championship teams play with a chip on their shoulder,” said Donofrio. “Abington’s confidence level was through the roof – and those kids believe that at the end of the game they will get the result they want.
“At this stage of the tournament, you have to be mentally tough,” added Donofrio. “And Abington was tougher than we were.”
And the toughness was evident from the opening tap – especially on the Ghosts’ defensive end of the floor. After spotting the Colonials a 2-0 lead on a pair of free throws by Andre Mitchell, Abington forced the high-octane PW offense into a dreadful 0-for-10 shooting performance from the field in the first period and finished the quarter with a 10-2 lead.
“We take a lot of pride in our defense,” said senior Matt Penecale, who scored 13 points and played another polished floor game at point guard. “When you play good defense – you win games. And winning is the most fun you can have playing basketball.”
While the Ghost defense put the clamps on PW in the first period, senior guard Amir Hinton scored the first seven Abington points. Hinton – who would go over 1000 points in his career in the second period – finished with a game-high 20 points.
“Coach Grasty told me to leave it all on the floor,” said Hinton. “It was very special to be able to get to 1000 points – but it was even more special to win this game.”
Abington extended the lead to 27-11 by the close of the first half. And again it was the Ghost defense that suffocated the Colonial offense which shot a dismal 3-for-10 from the field in the second period – and an even more dismal 3-20 from the field for the half.
“Abington plays a solid man-to-man defense, but what makes them good is that they help out and play great team defense,” said Donofrio. “But to be honest, we are a 24-3 team and I’m not too thrilled about us offensively. We have some gunslingers out there – and they tend to hold the ball too much.
“If we can’t shoot – and we can’t score – we can’t get into what we want to do defensively,” added Donofrio. “They controlled the pace of the game.”
Abington has had a disturbing habit of squandering halftime leads in the District One playoffs.
The Ghosts gave away a five-point lead against Chester in the third period and were outscored 15-10 by the Clippers before rallying for a 55-47 overtime win; the Ghosts gave away a nine-point halftime lead against Pennridge in the third period when they were outscored 18-8 by the Rams before rallying for a 58-49 win; and the Ghosts were outscored 24-7 in the third period against Pennsbury to give away a lead before rallying for a 49-40 victory over the Falcons.
“We came out at halftime with the idea of not letting up like we did against Pennsbury,” said Hinton. “We wanted to come out and play really hard defense and make them earn their points.”
“I was hoping we weren’t going to have to go through all that again – we needed to keep our composure,” said Grasty. “We could let them back in the game – or we could extend the lead.”
And the Ghosts chose the latter.
The third period numbers against Plymouth Whitemarsh erased any bad memories of previous district playoff third periods. PW shot a ghastly 3-of-17 from the field in the third stanza – while Abington shot a terrific 7-for-10 from the field. And by the close of the period, the competitive part of the game was over with the Ghosts leading 45-20.
Joining Hinton and Penecale in the spotlight in the third period was junior Brian Close who scored all seven of his points in the period. Freshman Robbie Heath – who scored eight points – and senior Brendan Gallagher each fired home 3-point bombs.
Plymouth Whitemarsh had reached the district final behind the lethal 3-M combination of Mitchell, Xzavier Malone, and Jimmy Murray. The talented trio was limited to just 24 points as Mitchell scored a team-high 15 points – Malone scored seven points – and Murray had just two points.
“Keeping those kids to those numbers is a testament to our defense,” said Grasty. “We wanted to contest every shot they took – and we did that.”
Coach Grasty may have wished he was the one playing in the game – but when the game was over, he was the one carrying the District One Men’s Basketball trophy to the bus.
Congratulations.
Abington Ghosts 10 17 18 8 * 53
Plymouth Whitemarsh 2 9 9 15 * 35
Abington: Amir Hinton 20; Matt Penecale 13; Robbie Heath 8; Brian Close 7; Brendan Gallagher 3; Jack Steinman 2. Totals – 53
Plymouth Whitemarsh: Andre Mitchell 15; Xzavier Malone 7; Oakley Spencer 4; Jimmy Murray 2; Davon Burrell 2; Cameron Johnson 2; Devon Monteiro-Gray 2; and Grady Minick 1. Total – 35.
Playback Games
#7 PENNSBURY 65, #9 RIDLEY 51 (Third Place)
Cameron Jones scored 28 points in a monster performance while Mekhi Bryan added 17 to lead the Falcons to the convincing win over the Green Raiders.
The Falcons established the tone for this one early, outscoring their visitors 17-6 in the opening frame. They went into halftime with a 33-23 lead and added to that with a 25-13 third quarter tear before Ridley used a 15-7 fourth quarter to make the final score more respectable.
Nick Cereby added eight points, and Rob Daley had seven on a night that saw the Falcons playing without Derrick Woods, who was serving a one-game suspension after picking up two fouls in Wednesday’s game against Abingon.
Ridley 6-17-13-15 51
Pennsbury 17-16-25-7 65
#3 PENNRIDGE 58, #12 LOWER MERION 36 (Fifth Place)
The Rams went into halftime on the short end of a 26-25 score in Friday’s fifth place game, but what looked as though it was going to be a nail biter turned into a rout when the Rams’ defense kept the visiting Aces off the scoreboard for the entire third period. The Rams scored 12 unanswered points in the frame and, for good measure, outscored the Aces 21-10 in the final quarter to win going away.
Dan Long (18 points), Zach Muredda (17 points) and Joe Molettiere (15 points) all had big games for the Rams, whose defense and a 33-10 second half were the difference on Friday night.
Lower Merion 13-13-0-10 36
Pennridge 14-11-12-21 58
Lower Merion (36) – Asher Barry 6, Steve Pendleton 2, Corey Sherman 3, Jule Brown 12, Jeremy Horn 4, Horton 2, Terrell Jones 2, Kelsey 3.
Pennridge (58) – Joe Molettiere 15, Dan Long 18, Zach Muredda 17, Joe Unangst 2, James White 1, Kyle Yoder 2, Luke Nuneviller 1, Ryan Galloway 2.
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