Following the Archbishop Carroll’s win over Valley Forge Military Academy earlier this week, boys basketball head coach Francis Bowe outlined two issues his team knew they needed to fix if they wanted to make a run into the Catholic League or state playoffs this year: defensive intensity and leadership.
“I mean, what did we hold them to — 40-50 points?” said Bowe. “The defensive intensity was all there, and that’s due to some great practice over the last few days.”
With a 55-48 win in Drexel Hill on Friday night, the Patriots also held the Archbishop Prendergast-Monsignor Bonner Friars to less than 50 points, and notably just five points in the third quarter. It marked just the second time this season Carroll had held an opposing side under 50 points in a game. Ironically, the last time they did so was all the way back on Jan. 12 against Lansdale Catholic, which also happened to be the team’s last PCL win. The lack of defensive intensity killed the Pats in games against both West Catholic, where they dropped a late lead, and Archbishop Wood, where Carroll let up 84 points to a sub-par Vikings club.
From the jump against Bonner, Carroll had a new groove, getting back on each possession while junior forward Luca Foster had four blocks on the night after stepping up in a multitude of ways.
“Luca Foster,” said Bowe. “That’s why he’s over there talking to Seton Hall. It’s coming together for him. You can see the smile on his face. It comes from a lot of private conversations in the last three or four days. That just became so important to us.”
With the second main issue being leadership, it always seemed Foster was the natural pick to take over in the vocal leader role for Carroll, although it never seemed to come together for the 6-foot-5-inch, four-star recruit completely. The more reserved Foster continued to do what he does best for most of the year — scoring buckets. Foster had undoubtedly been the Pats leader in the statistics department but had neglected to take the leadership role that usually comes with a spot like that until now.
“I’ve really realized that I just really have to step up as a leader,” said Foster. “Being a veteran, I’m one of the oldest on the team. While Ian [Williams] is out, I just really need to step up. I thought I was really vocal today, and, you know, I’m just going to keep on doing it from now on.”
The leadership from Foster was plain to see on the floor. Even as his team trailed for the majority of the game and nearly the entire first half along with some of the third quarter, Foster continued to lead the charge in every way.
Foster led Carroll with 29 points, while also directing his teammates at multiple intervals in the game and helping to calm them down as some questionable calls combined with a rowdy Bonner student section had tempers flaring. Even early in the game it was easy to see that cooler heads would need to prevail as the two clubs battled back and forth in the first quarter and into the second with Carroll trailing just behind Bonner for most of the half.
As the second half began however, Carroll came out with a new defensive intensity that held the Friars to only five points in the third quarter while the Pats dropped 17.
At the forefront of it all was Foster who kept his team rolling with a huge three to close the third. Going into the final period, Carroll led 38-30.
The Patriots continued to push the margin as high as 10 until the Friars’ comeback began. It seemed things would again go the way they’ve gone many times for Carroll this season, with the team blowing a late lead. However, after a few big timeouts from Bowe and Bonner head coach Billy Cassidy, the Pats were able to pull away for the final time. It was on the backs of sophomore forward Munir Grieg and Foster, who took turns running the court for some huge buckets following even bigger steals that silenced a wild Bonner student section and eventually closed out the contest for the Patriots with a huge win.
Even with the win, the Patriots advanced to a mere 3-7 on the Catholic League season and 8-11 overall. They’ll look ahead to Monday night’s matchup with Father Judge in the Northeast. That game has a 7 p.m. tipoff against one of the CL’s best and most physical teams.