Hill School opens season with a win over Perkiomen School
POTTSTOWN >> Coming into her first season as head coach at The Hill School last year, Jenn Weissbach’s goal was to establish a culture and set the tone for her team.
A year later, she’s starting to see it pay off.
Weissbach and the Blues opened up the 2016 campaign with a 40-9 win over Perkiomen School during the first round of the Hill School Tournament at Gillison Court on Friday night.
“The culture is set this season,” she said, “the girls know what I expect and they know what it will take to be successful. This was a good way for us to get it started.”
With the win, The Hill will square off against Mo’ne Davis and Springside-Chesnut Hill — 79-33 winners over Princeton Day School — on Saturday afternoon for the title game. Perk School will face Princeton Day School in the consolation round.
“It’s all about the little things for us,” added Weissbach. “Last season we started playing much more disciplined late in the season and we’re sort of seeing it carry over. Hopefully that’s good momentum going into the season.”
Hill School dominated from the opening tip, jumping out to an 18-0 lead before Perk got on the board — a Helena Tang jumper two minutes into the second quarter. Kelly Ebner paced the Blues with eight points while Mariah Sweeney followed with seven points and five boards. Maia Lockhart scored the first four points of the game — finishing with six points and five boards.
Senior Kathryn Dunn has been a part of the team over the past four seasons. The biggest difference between this season and last, though, started right from tryouts.
“It was really demanding, really intense from the very beginning,” said the Phoenixville native. “I think coach really made us come together and work as a team. She set the tone right away.”
That attitude has seemingly paid dividends, as The Hill played much more disciplined on both sides of the floor and out-rebounded Perk 25-17.
Coming into the night, first-year Perk School head coach Nikki Duggan knew what she and the Panthers would be up against.
“Hill’s got a strong reputation,” she said. “So we knew this would be a really tough one for us.”
Admittedly, though, Friday’s game provided her a glimpse of where she hopes her program will be by next season as she begins to establish her own culture.
“You can see how well she (Weissbach) has them playing together and as a team,” said Duggan, who spent time coaching at Neumann University following her playing career at Widener. “That’s something that we as a team are striving toward. That will come, but we know it takes time.”
Hannah Chiesa knocked down a three-pointer and grabbed six rebounds while Nicolette Ciocari finished 3-for-4 from the free throw line for the Panthers.
“We’re getting there,” said Duggan. “We’re hoping that we spend these first couple of games learning. We have five games in December and then we go into January.
“That’s what we’re trying to emphasize — spend this time practicing before we get into the league games. We’ve got to use these as building blocks for the season.”
Up The Hill
Ebner, a fifth-year senior from Wilson High School, made a seamless transition to playing with her new teammates.
“It’s definitely a change,” she said, “but I’m really excited to see what we can do this year. I like playing with this team. We have a lot of strong players, so we can spread the ball around really well.”
After leading the Bulldogs in scoring last season where she averaged over 10 points per game, Ebner notched all eight of her points during the first half Friday.
