Lansdale Catholic pulls away in 4th to beat North Penn

LANSDALE >> Grabbing a slight bit of control in the third quarter of a back-and-forth contest with North Penn, the Lansdale Catholic boys basketball team had no intention of giving it back in the fourth.

Steady free-throw shooting keyed a 10-1 run in the final quarter that turned the close nonleague matchup into a double-digit lead for the Crusaders, who held on to top the visiting Knights 63-55 Tuesday night.

“That’s what I’m proud of this team, we closed a win out,” LC coach Joe Corbett said. We had a tough one on Saturday (against Council Rock North), we closed that one out, came from behind. This one we played with the lead, stayed aggressive when we had to, made enough foul shots with the comfortable lead and I think with our guys we have such balanced scoring we can send anybody to the line and feel comfortable.”

The Crusaders’ first seven points in the fourth came at the line before Kellan Ward turned into the lane, got a short jumper to fall and drew a foul — Ward converting the 3-point play for a 57-47 lead with 2:49 left. From there the Knights could only cut the margin down to seven.

“It was a play we run all the time,” Ward said. “So I caught it and just turned around, floated one up and it worked out well.”

Ward collected eight of his team-high 12 points in the second half, Liam McDonnell hit three 3-pointers in scoring 11 points while LJ Phillips added another 11 points for Lansdale Catholic (2-1).

“I think we just found energy and our teammates were picking each other up,” Ward said. “And we kept fueling each other, going off each other’s energy.”

Rob Carangi hit a trio of threes in leading all scorers with 13 points for North Penn (1-2), which made 10 3-pointers — the Knights’ first 21 points coming from beyond the arc. Billy Coley had 11 points while Joe Larkins chipped in 10 points.

“I thought they out-physicaled us in the second half,” North Penn coach John Conrad said. “On the offensive glass especially.”

The teams finished the first half even at 27 and were tied four more times in the third, the last time at 36 before a pair of free throws from McDonnell and Jay Hicks gave LC a 40-36 lead at 4:23.

Mike Chaffee’s 3-point play off a steal had North Penn within 40-39 at 3:23 but Jimmy Casey scored on an offensive rebound and was fouled at 2:46. Casey couldn’t complete the and-one but Phillips grabbed the miss and his putback had LC up five. A Casey free throw at 2:06 made it 45-39.

“I thought we were a little bit more disciplined on defense,” Corbett said. “We forced them off the 3-point line — that was the gameplan going in. And I think all of their points in the first quarter were off threes, the majority in the first half were off threes. At halftime, we said listen you got to make them put the ball on the floor, you have to make them shoot contested twos, chase them off the 3-point line and guys stuck to the plan.

“And we started to kind of inch away and the second half we ran such better offense. I don’t know what it is with our guys, they need like eight minutes to remember the plays but they ran much better offense in the second half.”

A Matt Swanson tip-in just before the buzzer had the Knights down 47-44 entering the fourth with Carangi scoring after his steal under the basket made it 47-46. But the Crusaders began earning trips to the line and connected on seven of their first nine free throws in the fourth to go up 54-47 with 4:55 remaining. Ward’s 3-point play at 2:37 gave LC its biggest lead of the night which it matched at 61-51 at 1:10.

“The plays that got us the lead were set plays that we run practice every day and it’s the first quarter I’m wondering what these guys are doing, they’re at the wrong spot,” Corbett said. “And it started to click, our defense improved and our offense improved. So that was the stretch in the third quarter when we built that lead up.”

Both teams are back in action Thursday. Lansdale Catholic begins Philadelphia Catholic League play on the road against Roman Catholic at 3:45 p.m. North Penn, meanwhile opens its SOL Continental Conference schedule against Souderton at 8 p.m. in the second game of boy/girl doubleheader that begins at 6:30 p.m.

“It’s a good group of kids, we’re working hard,” Conrad said. “I think this is the second game where we’ve been out-physicaled so that’s going to be something we got to focus on.”

All 12 of North Penn’s points in the first quarter came on threes — Milind Pulugura’s triple putting the Knights up 12-7 before a McDonnell trey had the Crusaders down two at the end of the quarter.

“We knew they were going to be a shooting team before the game but then the were still nailing threes in the first half so we really had to get up on them after that,” Ward said.

A John Dolan three followed by two Carangi free throws gave North Penn a 23-15 lead with 4:11 left in the half but the Crusaders ran off the next nine points — five by Hicks — to go ahead 24-23 on a Ward basket.

Coley’s putback had the Knights back in the lead 25-24 before McDonnell drained a three. A Coley layup on a drive down the lane knotted the contest 27-27 at the break.

Lansdale Catholic 63, North Penn 55
North  Penn       12 15 17 11 — 55
Lansdale Catholic             10 17 20 16 — 63
North Penn: Rob Carangi 4 2-2 13; Billy Coley 4 1-2 11; Joe Larkins 4 0-0 10; Mike Chaffee 2 3-3 7; John Dolan 2 0-0 6; Matt Swanson 2 1-6 5; Milind Pulugura 1 0-0 3;  Totals 19 7-13 55.
Lansdale Catholic: Kellan Ward 4 4-5 12;  Liam McDonnell 3 2-4 11; LJ Phillips 5 0-0 11; Jay Hicks 2 4-6 9; Jimmy Casey 2 3-5 7; Sean Gibbons 2 1-2 7; Hunter Healy 1 4-7 6; Totals 19 18-29 63.
3-pointers: NP-Carangi 3, Coley 2, Dolan 2, Larkins 2, Pulugura; LC-McDonnell 3, Gibbons 2, Hicks, Phillips.