MCCUE: Methacton’s best team ever keeps adding passengers on its historic ride

PHILADELPHIA >> The upcoming holiday brought a large group of former Methacton hoopers together last Thanksgiving Eve at Chap’s Taproom on Ridge Pike.

With basketball season right around the corner, the conversation naturally steered toward memories of the hardwood and which team could claim to be the Warriors’ boys basketball program’s best.

Though the debate was never settled — members of the 2013 and 2015 squads made the strongest arguments — the consensus among those involved was that none of them would hold that title for much longer. 

After back-to-back Pioneer Athletic Conference championships and the deepest state run in school history, the 2019-20 Warriors’ boys basketball team was set to best them all. 

On Saturday, Methacton ended any debate. The top-seeded Warriors fulfilled that projection, defeating third-seeded Cheltenham, 73-48, for the District 1 Class 6A championship, the program’s first district title.

Already in a class of its own with its threepeat in the PAC and the school’s first district quarterfinal and semifinal wins, this Methacton group once again asserted itself as the type that comes through most high schools … maybe once every 50 years if you’re lucky? 

“Everyone is always gonna say they’re the best team,” Sean Mann, a member of the 2015 squad texted me after Methacton’s dominant win over Chester on Tuesday. “These guys though… (players) 1-7 are legit and all know their roles.”

I was a sophomore at Methacton in 2012 when the program won its first Pioneer Athletic Conference championship four seasons after joining the league, and a junior the next season when eventual Saint Joseph’s walk-on Brendan Casper, the 2012-2013 Mercury All-Area Player of the Year, helped guide the program to states for the first time.

The 2015 squad, which featured a large group of kids who I played sports with growing up, won the program’s first state playoff game and held the most wins in school history until last year’s squad bested that mark by one game.

That stretch of four years from 2012-2015 was the best Methacton boys hoops had seen up until that point. My first 14 months at The Mercury have just so happened to coincide with another stretch that is becoming even more impressive.

In my early tenure as a local high school sports writer, I’ve heard athletes describe the community rallying behind them during their deep postseason runs. The Pennridge team that knocked Methacton out of the state playoffs a season ago spoke of what it was like to have their town follow them on their quest for a state championship.

Methacton Athletic Director Paul Spiewak said before Saturday’s game that this team’s run has reminded of what it was like during the 2014 Methacton baseball squad’s District 1 championship run, mentioning how many people have reached out to him in the past few weeks hoping to chat about this Warriors’ boys basketball team. He said you’re reminded of just how many people are actually following your program.

The extra eyes on the Methacton boys basketball team have not gone unnoticed.

“We have one of the best support groups and student sections,” said Methacton senior Erik Timko, who led the Warriors with 27 points Saturday. “They’re the reason we have the momentum and energy and confidence. They help us and keep us going.”

Methacton senior Jeff Woodward, who finished with 20 points, noted that as he looked out into the crowd Saturday at the Liacouras Center he could see at least a handful of green shirts in every section.

“We always have had a great student turnout,” Woodward said while clutching the championship trophy after the game. “We’ve always had great crowds, but I think over the past, especially last year and really into this year, it is the people who maybe their kid went to Methacton three, four years ago, maybe they have a cousin who still goes there, maybe they’ve got no relation at all and they’re just really big basketball fans.

They’ve just been coming out more and more every single game. It’s just really cool to see all the hard work, and all the talent we have and to pay off. Give a great product, give a great show to the community and just thank them for their support.”

Covering this Warriors’ squad has been unique as I’m not only reporting on but still have connections to the Methacton High School community. I’ve myself received texts and Twitter messages from friends, former classmates, neighbors asking just how good this Methacton team really is and when is the next time they can watch them play. 

In the stands at games, I’ve seen so many familiar faces: Former teachers, coaches, even parents of friends whose kids have long graduated from the school.

Throughout this season and last at Methacton games, I’ve caught up with those former players who once debated their claim for the spot on the ‘Best Ever Wall’ outside the gym at the high school have come and watched this group play.

After following the box scores and reading the reporting on this team, they are still often taken aback at just how good they are in person. 

Pete Donahue, who helped Methacton win its first PAC title in 2012, came up to me before Saturday’s championship game, which was his first time watching the team in person, and simply said, “Can you believe this?” 

For those who pushed the program to its first PAC title, first state playoff appearance, first state playoff win, to see something like a District 1 championship accomplished feels not only unprecedented but almost beyond belief.

“Certainly when you start making bigger runs like this, you hear from more people,” Methacton 10th-year coach Jeff Derstine said. “But kids who have been through the program, I hear from a lot of the kids. I talk about it with our current teams all the time. I’ll let them know when I hear from someone. There’s a lot of pride in being part of the program. It brings back some great memories for some awesome kids we’ve had come through here. It’s been a long line of great basketball players and tremendous kids.

“What these guys are doing right now is certainly connected to those guys. They grew up watching them…These guys were in fourth and fifth grade when Brendan Casper was here with Matt Forrest and that group who made it to the state tournament. It’s pretty cool to see the connection with all these guys.”

Woodward, the program’s first Mercury All-Area player of the year since Casper, will leave Methacton as the best to put on the Green and White uniform. He is the Methacton all-time leader in points, rebounds and presumably is in a class of his own with blocks as well.

Timko has become one of just eight 1,000-point scorers in program history and is in the midst of one of the best individual scoring seasons in school history. Senior point guard Brett Eberly, who had nine assists Saturday, holds the school record for assists in a season and in a career. 

Collectively with fellow senior Owen Kroop, their list of team accomplishments never before achieved at the school is equally as long and grew another line longer with Saturday’s District 1 title win.

One day this group of Methacton players will meet somewhere — maybe it’s at Chap’s on Thanksgiving Eve  — and they’ll reflect on their remarkable high school careers.  

When they do it’s hard to imagine any of their predecessors or successors will have a case to make against them as the greatest boys basketball team in Methacton history.

“It’s very special, and it’s obviously going to stick with us throughout our whole lives,” Timko said. 

It’ll likely stick with the many others who have been along for their historic run too.