Plymouth Whitemarsh rolls Norristown on Senior Night
WHITEMARSH >> The Plymouth Whitemarsh boys basketball team ended its regular season and celebrated Senior Night with a 65-43 Suburban One League American Conference win over Norristown Thursday night.
The Colonials (20-1, 13-1) entered the week as the third seed in the latest unofficial District One AAAA power rankings. After beating Cheltenham Tuesday and now Norristown, it seems unlikely that Plymouth Whitemarsh will fall out of the top four seeds, which get to play three home games in the district tournament.
“I would hope so,” PW coach Jim Donofrio said of this win locking up a top-four seed. “Everything is still preliminary … That was one of the main goals of this season. Can you win the league first? Can you get a great seed at districts? Then it’s up to you, it’s a new season now. I like where we’re at, I like how we’re evolving and I like our confidence.”
The Colonials entered halftime with a four-point lead over Norristown. They went on an 8-0 run in the first couple of minutes of the third quarter and Norristown never got within shouting distance again.
“We had a bad stretch,” Norristown coach Mike Evans said, “the first two minutes of the third and the last two minutes of the third. That cost us this game. That was the difference.”
Xzavier Malone led PW in scoring with 18 points, Oakley Spencer added 12, Kevin Ashenfelter 11 and Mike Lotito 10. All four of those players are seniors.
Plymouth Whitemarsh’s regular season is over and they will participate in the Suburban One League playoffs starting Saturday at Council Rock North. The postseason features the winner of each of the three SOL conferences and the fourth team is whichever school finished highest in the rankings. PW, the SOL American champ, does not know who it will play or at what time.
“We’ll get together as a team (Friday),” Donofrio said. “It’s a little odd as far as you don’t know who you’re playing kind of thing … Little different being used to preparing, but we’re going to do whatever we have to to get something positive out of the experience.”
The loss ends the Eagles (9-12, 6-7) slight hope at a District One AAAA playoff berth.
Norristown entered the week ranked No. 41 in the unofficial rankings and needed to climb to 32 to get in. It had won four of its previous five games and had highly ranked PW and Cheltenham remaining to earn points.
“Coming into this week we felt like we had two tough games ahead of us,” Evans said. “We thought we could be competitive and at least make a little bit of a run, but tonight we got away from our game plan.”
Roy Green led Norristown in scoring with 14 points and Amir Carter added 11.
The Eagles host Cheltenham Friday at 7 p.m. to conclude their season.
