High school roundup: Upper Dublin secures league crown; Phoenixville grabs first division title

The high school basketball games mean more this time of year with league and district playoff implications abound. With many leagues set to begin their postseason next week, there was plenty of action to go around.

Here’s a roundup of the best games and storylines.

Upper Dublin head coach Derek Brooks was 11 years old and none of his players were born the last time the Cardinals won an outright league championship. But on Thursday night, the Cardinals knocked off league rival Plymouth Whitemarsh to clinch the Suburban One League Liberty Division championship outright, marking the program’s first title since 2002.

Junior guard Ryan Mulroy had 18 points in the 54-45 win, which marked Upper Dublin’s first win against the Colonials since February 2014.

“It feels so good,” Mulroy said. “Freshman year we had to share it with PW. It doesn’t really feel like a championship when you have to share it. It’s just an awesome feeling. We haven’t beat those guys in ten years. So to be able to beat them and win it outright in the same night, it’s just awesome.”

The Bensalem girls’ basketball team missed out on the district playoffs a season ago, and after a 3-4 start, it looked more of the same this season.

Coach Steve Johnson’s squad, however, figured things out and has now won 11 of its last 12 games. The Owls who finished ranked No. 39 in the district last year at 8-14, are all the way up to No. 11, sporting a 14-5 mark heading into Friday night.

On Wednesday night, the Owls broke a 15-game losing streak against SOL division rival Pennsbury with a 44-40 victory.

“It’s great to have people think that we’re not just Bensalem anymore,” said Bensalem’s Mikayla Donahue. “It was our last shot at [Pennsbury], unless we face them in the playoffs, and it just feels good to finally get one against them, especially at home on our senior night.”

The Academy New Church boys (17-4) won a trio of Friends Schools League games to finish its first perfect run through the FSL since 2008. One of the teams’ two senior starters, Nolan Waldon, had a big fourth quarter in a victory over Westtown (66-48) on Thursday that followed wins over George School (71-55) and Abington Friends (85-51).

The Lions lost in the league title game a season ago and haven’t won the league crown since 2009. They also won the league title following their last unbeaten FSL slate in 2008.

“Just keep playing the way that we’re playing, play defense, rebound the ball, and make sure everybody eats, everybody gets buckets,” Waldon said of what ANC needs to do to win the league tournament.

The Coatesville boys avenged its lone league loss of the season with a 61-44 win over West Chester Henderson on Monday, a matchup that pitted the top teams in the Ches-Mont League National division and in District 1 against each other.

The Raiders’ victory, which was led by 12 points from Amon Fowlkes, gave Coatesville the Ches-Mont National lead with two division games remaining. The win over No. 2 West Chester Henderson also boosted the Raiders to No. 6 in the District 1-6A power rankings.

» READ MORE: Sun Valley boys’ basketball secures playoff spot after win over Delco Christian on Wednesday

Phoenixville sophomore guard Dawson Brown scored 20 points against Pottstown on Tuesday to clinch its first Frontier division title since the Pioneer Athletic Conference moved to two divisions in 2016-17.

Brown is the son of former Pottstown standout Howard Brown, who played at Villanova, and had a big night in the gym his dad used to play in.

“Of course, I feel like a lot of people think it’s supposed to be pressure on me, like I’m trying to prove something, but I just have to go out there and play my game, do what I can do to help my team win,” Brown said.

The Spring-Ford boys are down a starter after football star Matt Zollers suffered a broken foot. After the Rams lost their first league game of the season to Methacton earlier in the week, they responded with a win over rival Perkiomen Valley on Thursday to capture the Pioneer Athletic Conference Liberty Division title and a first-round bye in next week’s playoffs.

Junior Jordan Marsilio, a football player and a deep reserve to begin the year, has stepped up in Zollers’ absence, including in the win over Perk Valley.

“I told the guys, there’s a lesson in resilience,” said Spring-Ford head coach Joe Dempsey. “He didn’t play much earlier in the year. ... and now we go through stretches where we can’t take him off the floor.”

This story was produced as part of a partnership between The Inquirer and City of Basketball Love, a nonprofit news organization that covers high school and college basketball in the Philadelphia area while also helping mentor the next generation of sportswriters. This collaboration will help boost coverage of the city’s vibrant amateur basketball scene, from the high school ranks up through the Big 5 and beyond.