Plymouth Whitemarsh guard Abby Sharpe worked to reach her potential and found her way to Penn

When Abby Sharpe didn’t make the cut for the A team for the Comets AAU program she had been with since fourth grade, she wasn’t sure about her basketball future.

Sharpe had just finished eighth grade and was preparing to enter her freshman season at Plymouth Whitemarsh. The Lafayette Hill native had always loved basketball, and she knew that she wanted to play in college.

Those goals had led her to the Comets, a program that has helped players go on to play everywhere from the Big 5 to the Big Ten. After getting cut, Sharpe’s path to college basketball seemed muddier, and she wondered if those dreams could still become reality.

“There was a time where I didn’t know if it was something that I really wanted to keep doing,” Sharpe said. “I had to dig deep, kind of within myself, and just think about if that’s really what I wanted to keep doing, if I wanted to play in college, and if I could play in college.”

Ultimately, Sharpe’s love of the game won out, and she committed not just to finding another AAU program, but also to doing the work necessary to reach her potential.

“I knew I wanted to play at the next level,” Sharpe said. “So, it was kind of just me being like ‘You know what, I’m just going to put my head down and work, and I’m going to get to where I know I could be.’ ”

It was shortly after Sharpe left the Comets program that Bill McDonough Jr. got a call about the 5-foot-11 guard. After McDonough, coach of the Lady Runnin’ Rebels AAU club, watched film on Sharpe, he knew she had potential.

Though McDonough’s recognition of Sharpe’s potential might’ve seemed innocuous on the surface, those around Sharpe knew how much it meant to the young guard.

“I think that was a huge step for her mentally,” Sharpe’s mother, Jessica, said. “To understand that she is capable, there are people that believe in her, and she’s just got to believe in herself at the same level, I think that was a big, pivotal moment for her.”

By the time Sharpe’s freshman season at PW began, she had started to rebuild her on-court confidence.

Sharpe filled a sixth-man role for the Colonials, starting games seated at the front of the bench between PW’s assistant coaches. In that role, Sharpe played the third-most minutes on the team and was a scoring threat off the bench.

Though she drew a few starts as a sophomore during the COVID-shortened season, Sharpe continued to make her impact off the bench, quietly gaining confidence with each additional game rep.

She also started to make plays that showcased that same potential that McDonough had seen on film. When Colonials point guard Kaitlyn Flanagan missed a few games with an injury, Sharpe was there to step in. Later in the season, Sharpe hit a deep three-pointer in a game at Abington that helped tie the score and set up a Colonials victory.

“Her sophomore year was the crazy, COVID-shortened year, but she took a lot of steps,” Colonials coach Dan Dougherty said. “[She] really started to mature [and] really started to understand the game a little bit more … You could start to see the growth during her sophomore year.”

While it was during that sophomore season that Sharpe first started showing flashes of the player she was becoming, it was during the summer that followed that her game transformed. Sharpe emerged as a full-fledged Division I recruit.

“Her breakout was the summer between her sophomore and junior years,” Sharpe’s father, Cliff, said. “She finished that summer with seven good Division I offers.”

Said Dougherty: “The college attention really built up. The hype really built up.”

Sharpe entered her junior year with renewed confidence. For the first time, she earned a spot as an every-game starter in the talented PW rotation.

She joined a starting five that had no shortage of talent. The Colonials were led by Flanagan and center Lainey Allen, who are committed to Holy Cross and Maryland Eastern Shore, respectively. The Flanagan-Allen duo was flanked by forward Jordyn Thomas, who is committed to play with Division II Thomas Jefferson.

» READ MORE: Undefeated Plymouth Whitemarsh and its trio of star seniors

The Colonials’ breadth of talent prevented defenses from keying on any one player. When an opposing defense did lock in on one player, it was normally one of the senior standouts.

As a result, Sharpe had the chance to operate freely on the floor, putting all her skills on display, and proving that her summer breakout was no fluke.

“She’s a kid that on other teams would probably get boxed-in-one or face guarded up and down the floor,” Dougherty said. “Being that she played on such a talented team, you couldn’t do that to us. It really allowed her to have a special year.”

Some of Sharpe’s most special moments on the floor this year came during Plymouth Whitemarsh’s postseason run. At the end of the first half of the Colonials’ District 1 championship matchup with Spring-Ford, Sharpe hit a deep three to cushion Plymouth Whitemarsh’s lead entering the second half.

Perhaps Sharpe’s biggest moment, however, came during the state championship game against Mt. Lebanon. With an undefeated season and a state championship on the line, Sharpe set a career-high with 26 points.

Sharpe’s performance in Hershey was the exclamation point on her junior season and proved just how far she’d come since first arriving at PW. The performance also added a major boost to her recruiting stock.

With the April live periods immediately after the state playoffs, Sharpe figured to see an influx of major Division I offers. But she didn’t need to wait for other offers, having already picked up an offer from Penn in March, just days before the state quarterfinals. Penn checked all the boxes.

“I felt a close connection with Coach [Mike] McLaughlin,” Sharpe said. “Visiting there and seeing the players and meeting them, I just fell in love with the whole culture of the team there and just the whole environment.

“It just had so many fits, and I just feel like it was just the perfect fit for me, and I just wanted to jump on the opportunity.”

Before Sharpe lives out that college basketball dream, she has one last ride with Plymouth Whitemarsh. She’ll take on a different role in the upcoming season, as the graduation of Flanagan, Allen, and Thomas leaves Sharpe and Erin Daley as the team’s returning starters.

Sharpe, who was elected as senior class president, is ready to embrace a leadership position for the Colonials.

“[The seniors] gave us a lot of leadership skills that I think Erin and I will both be able to take into next season,” Sharpe said. “I’ve talked to Kaitlyn Flanagan a lot before she leaves about having that point guard leadership role because I think that’s something I’ll take up more next year.

“We’re excited. I think we’re still going to be a great team, and the tradition is being passed on.”