The Reporter/Times Herald/Montgomery Media 2022-2023 Girls Basketball Player of the Year: Lansdale Catholic’s Gabby Casey elevated program, profile to new level
It was a scene that had happened over and over and over again the past four years.
A standout basketball player, in a gym away from any cameras or crowds, a game uniform nowhere in sight, was working on their own and putting up shots on a familiar court. Except, this time, they weren’t alone.
One player, a good bit younger, approached and a little timidly asked the one question they had to know.
“Are you Gabby?”
Gabby Casey had that effect this season, the Lansdale Catholic senior elevating her play once again and this time bringing the Crusaders to historic new heights. Casey’s finale delivered on every objective she set for herself and Lansdale Catholic, as a result the senior has been selected as The Lansdale Reporter/Times Herald/Montgomery Media Girls Basketball Player of the Year.
“It was a feeling of relief but a good relief,” Casey said. “To see all the hard work we put in and to accomplish what we were saying – keep talking our talk – that’s what we focused on. I think it motivates us in other aspects of life, seeing that hard work pay off.
“We had a goal, a mission, and to be able to accomplish it meant everything.”
GIRLS BASKETBALL: @lcladycrusaders @_gabbycasey does her thing and gets a bucket in the paint Q3 against Blackhawk
Casey had six points and assited the go-ahead three in LC's 11-0 run to end the quarter pic.twitter.com/rFogQbABOr— Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3) March 26, 2023
That moment in the gym wasn’t an outlier either.
Early on, Casey recognized almost every game brought a line of little girls hoping for a photo with her or in some cases asking if they were sharing a rec center court with her. Her play was elevating her team but it was also elevating her and it took some getting used to.
“That’s what motivated me to keep going,” Casey said. “It was so cool for me to see I could be a role model for little kids. Seeing how much of an impact I can have in the community, it motivated me to want to be a good role model.
“That moment at the rec center with that girl, it’s something I’ll remember forever.”
Casey hasn’t seen it yet, but everything she and her teammates accomplished this season has been packed into a showcase right near LC’s front doors. Those PCL and state title trophies acting as a pair of sentinels watching over a District 12 title, a giant Hershey’s bar, and the banner denoting Casey as the Gatorade Pennsylvania State Player of the Year.
For the season, the 5-foot-9 senior averaged 21.5 points per game. She added 8.4 rebounds, 3.4 assists, 4.1 steals and 1.1 blocks per outing, broke LC’s girls’ scoring record then the school’s all-time points mark a few weeks later and finished with 1,724 points.
She was the PCL girls’ basketball MVP, the first ever Crusader to claim that honor. Her performance in the state playoffs, especially the semifinals against Scranton Prep then the 28 points and 16 rebounds against Blackhawk in Hershey brought plaudits like “bucket,” “legit,” “impressive” and “the truth” from people seeing her play for the first time.
For those who had been with her all year, it was just Gabby.
“Every time we were down or needed something, it’d always be her,” Lansdale Catholic junior guard Olivia Boccella said in Hershey. “She’d get anything, whatever we needed.
“She’s so clutch and everything she does is just crazy to watch. I’ve never played with anyone like her before.”
When Casey, who hails from Quakertown, decided to attend Lansdale Catholic, she wasn’t entering a program that was exactly a powerhouse in girls’ basketball. The Crusaders had produced some quality players and they were showing signs of trending upward but were still a way off from contending in the PCL, much less pushing for a state title.
She would have been the first player off the bench as a freshman if not for an injury to another player minutes into her first game. That year ended with promise but the next couldn’t have gone much worse with a 2-11 record although there was a silver lining in Boccella joining the program, the two forming an instant bond that’s only strengthened the last two years.
As much as the team wanted to put that 2020-21 year to rest – most of the players in the program this year weren’t even part of that team – Casey embraces what it did do for her. That, and last year’s ending in Hershey with a loss in the state final, laid the foundation for a senior season show.
“The way we ended, it really set me off to not want to feel like that again. I felt like last year, we let everybody down,” Casey said. “I know we weren’t expected to win, but to get there, I think that was the factor that was different this year.”
Statistically, she averaged more rebounds as a sophomore and was a sliver higher in terms of points per game as a junior but there would be times where Casey would get too reckless or try to win a game by herself and fall short. This year, her game matured and she knew she had the right teammates to help her.
“The team didn’t depend on me as much as they did last season,” Casey said. “It made me feel like there was less pressure on my shoulders and it opened it up for everybody else.
“Having more confidence this season, both in myself and in others, it helped me keep calm on the floor and do my thing.”
A snap of the camera’s shutter captured it all.
It was a moment of triumph, Gabby Casey with a beaming smile on her face, her arms raised aloft holding the Philadelphia Catholic League’s round trophy with a wall of Lansdale Catholic fans behind her. A month later Casey would be in almost the same position, this time holding a state championship trophy, smiling and surrounded by her supporters.
Casey also knows she wouldn’t have done any of it without her teammates. She recalled the team’s Senior Night as a real turning point in the season, the entire group staying well after the game in LC’s cafeteria and shedding a well of tears, the seniors expressing gratitude for the underclassmen and vice-versa.
The PCL championship game, which the Crusaders won 50-47 over Archbishop Wood in a fantastic game under the fabled rafters of The Palestra, was a quick choice for Casey’s proudest accomplishment of the season. Not too long before a photograph captured her in that moment of triumph, it was Casey giving up the ball to Boccella for the now-immortal three that gave LC the lead.
“She pushes me to be a better person too, it’s fun to be around her,” Boccella said after their final game as teammates. “She’s so dedicated to the game and seeing her do it, it makes me want to be a better player and love the game the way she does.”
While Casey chalked up some of the things that set her apart like the athleticism, the instincts that made a wrecking ball on defense or the strength that powered her to the basket over and over again as “God-given,” just as much of it was on her.
The three-point shot she didn’t have her first two years, the turnaround jumpers in the lane like the one that kicked off the game-changing run in the state final, the vision to snap off passes, that all came through a lot of work. It doesn’t mean it was always easy.
There were days she didn’t want to be in the gym, days where the ball stubbornly refused to go in or she couldn’t quite get something right. Everyone who plays basketball has those days but what separates the ones who want it is that they’re not walking out the door when it happens.
“The feeling of accomplishment and relief for yourself, that’s what pushes me,” Casey said. “Having the mindset that there’s always somebody out there working as hard, if not harder, than you, that’s what leads to the motivation of wanting to be great and spending every day getting better, even if it’s only a little bit.
“When you love something and you put everything into it, you’re going to see results.”
GIRLS BASKETBALL: The final basket of @_gabbycasey with @lcladycrusaders comes at a key time, giving LC a 49-45 lead with a minute to play against Blackhawk in the PIAA 4A title game
Casey capped her career with 28 points and 16 rebounds leading @LCCrusaders to the state title pic.twitter.com/3cVIcIBQgW— Andrew Robinson (@ADRobinson3) March 26, 2023
One saying Casey was fond of this year was “the future is bright.” For her, it’s very true, the senior having committed to play for St. Joe’s next year with the Hawks coming off a WNIT appearance this season.
Gabby Casey elevated herself and her team to a new level this year but no matter how competitive the game or how much pressure permeated the moment, she never lost the fun that drew her to the game in the first place.
“It’s always in the back of my mind, I put so much pressure on myself that I feel like if I don’t play well, then I’m letting everybody else down and myself down,” Casey said. “I still get nervous before games, especially big games, but if you have the confidence you put in the hard work, then it will show when you’re in the game.”
