Gillespie scores 25, Archbishop Wood rolls past Abington
CHELTENHAM >> Wednesday night’s Play-by-Play Classic matchup featuring Abington and Archbishop Wood should have been a good game.
On the one hand was an Abington team that won the Suburban One League National Conference for the fifth year in a row last season matched up with an experienced and Philadelphia Catholic League battle tested team in Wood.
“We were focused,” Wood coach John Mosco said. “We had three tough games in D.C. over the weekend, we came back 1-2. The kids were focused, we really shared the ball, played well together and really concentrated on defense.”
Wood used effective guard play led by senior Collin Gillespie and excellent team defensive effort as the Vikings (2-2) pulled away from the Ghosts (3-1) in the second half for a convincing 71-46 win at Arcadia University’s Alumni Gymnasium.
The difference in the game came from the Wood guards’ ability to dribble-drive on the Abington defense while defending the Abington guards from doing the same on the other end.
“I feel like we have senior guards, Collin Gillespie, Keith Otto, Matt Cerruti and Tyree (Pickron), they could handle the ball and handle the pressure and beat them off the dribble,” Mosco said. “We were able to do that and get into the lane and set each other up for some good shots.”
To stop the Abington offense, Wood was keen on shutting down Ghosts sophomore big man Eric Dixon. The Vikings held the forward to 14 points, limiting him to just three in the first half.
“We knew they were trying to get Dixon the ball,” Mosco said. “We were just trying to get physical with him, fronting him and help side help. (We) tried to defend him in the post and cut off their dribble drive.”
Defensively, the Ghosts had no answer for Gillespie as the crafty guard carved his way through the Abington defense for a game-high 25 points.
“He’s a senior guard and he’s been through a lot of wars in the Catholic League and he controlled the game,” Mosco said. “He’s really coming of age, maturing, taking over the game and creating the pace that he wants.”
Wood will play a tough a non-league schedule to start it’s 2016 campaign and the team’s performance and result on Wednesday gives it a nice feather to stick in the cap with some tough games still to play.
“We got Scranton Prep on Saturday, a tough opponent at our place,” Mosco said. “I just told them I just scheduled tough to challenge you guys. We really need them to step up to the challenge.”
Archbishop Wood 71, Abington 46
Archbishop Wood 11 15 20 25—71
Abington 10 8 16 12—46
Archbishop Wood: Collin Gillespie 7 8-9 25; Keith Otto 3 1-2 9; Tyree Pickron 7 2-3 18; Seth Pickney 1 0-0 2; Matt Cerruti 1 0-0 2; Karrington Wallace 3 0-0 6; Andrew Funk 2 0-0 5; Chris Garland 1 0-0 2; Zahree Harrison 0 2-2 2; totals 25 13-15 71
Abington: Rob Young 1 0-0 3; Robbie Heath 4 3-4 11; Lucas Monroe 2 2-2 6; Joe O’Brien 1 1-2 3; Eric Dixon 5 4-5 14; Eric Dougherty 2 0-0 6; Darious Brown 1 0-0 2; Brandon Coffman 0 1-2 1; totals 16 11-15 46
Three-point goals: Young, Dougherty 2, Gillespie, Otto 2, Funk
