BENSALEM – Brean Rudd-Cook’s assignment coming into Saturday’s District 1 Class A final was clear. By the end of the first quarter, he would add another layer to it.
The athletic Chester Charter Scholars Academy wing was tasked on the defensive end with making sure that Peter Haviland, Phil-Mont Christian’s most dangerous perimeter scorer, couldn’t get going. When Emohj Barrett was the first of several Sabers felled by foul trouble, Rudd-Cook knew he’d have to redouble his efforts on the glass, too.
Add in a few clutch 3-pointers, and Rudd-Cook ended up executing it all about as well as possible.
Rudd-Cook scored 13 points and grabbed eight rebounds, as Chester Charter’s defense stifled Haviland and company on the way to a 62-51 victory at Bensalem High and a second straight district title.
Haviland scored 15 points. But it was a quiet outing from him. He went just 3-for-9 from the field, and he had the only two makes for Phil-Mont Christian from 3-point range in a frustrating 2-for-17 afternoon.
Without Haviland hitting jumpers, the Falcons were short on offensive solutions, as a second quarter in which they didn’t score from the field showed.
“Just stopping him from shooting,” Rudd-Cook said. “I knew he was going to be shooting a lot. We were just stopping him from getting open shots.”
Overall, top-seeded Phil-Mont was a ghastly 13-for-46 from the field (28.3 percent). That included 0-for-11 in the second quarter. It committed 19 turnovers, less than Chester Charter’s 23 in a game played too recklessly fast for either team. But many of the prayers thrown up by Phil-Mont on out-of-control drives to the lane were merely turnovers with the basket, rim or sometimes nothing at all mediating.
On the back of the second-quarter near shutout, Chester Charter led 27-15 at half. The lead stretched to 17 in the third, though Phil-Mont would get back into it.
About the only thing consistently working for the Falcons was Jameer Zachary off the bounce. He scored 13 of his game-high 23 points in the third. He was helped by a propensity to draw contact, with the 26 fouls called on Chester Charter to just 16 on Phil-Mont (it was 24-10 at one point.) That tally included three technical fouls whistled on the Sabers to the Falcons’ one.
Chester Charter led 48-36 after three, but a technical helped Phil-Mont rattle six straight points to cut it to 48-42 early in the fourth. Phil-Mont was just 23-for-36 from the line in squandering that edge.
Chester Charter answered with a basket from Calvin Lewis, and the Sabers didn’t leave the door ajar at the line, hitting 13-for-15 from the free-throw line.
Rudd-Cook had a 3-pointer in every quarter. Derek Bean added 13 points, attacking the short corner behind Phil-Mont Christian’s zone in the first half to great effect.
“That’s him,” Rudd-Cook said. “He can eat there a lot, too. Derek is really good down there. He uses his body a lot and gets easy buckets.”
Freshman Christopher Cook had eight points, as did Lewis, who hit a pair of clutch 3-pointers in the third. Ja’Bryl Bennett, who sat most of the first half with foul trouble, had seven points and four assists, as did Ahsir Grandy. Grandy added six rebounds and five steals.
Luis Torres had 10 points before fouling out for Phil-Mont. Only four Falcons scored.
Chester Charter, the third seed in District 1, struggled at times this year on the way to a 14-10 record. But to win a second straight district title, after beating Phil-Mont in the final last year, means the Sabers have proven what they wanted.
“We had a lot of prove,” Rudd-Cook said. “A lot of people thought we couldn’t do it, and today we proved them wrong.”
