David Hassinger (@david_hassinger),
Ari Rosenfeld (@realA_rosenfeld) &
Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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The Saint Joseph’s high school team camp has nearly 40 squads from the greater Philadelphia region (and a few from slightly beyond that) on Hawk Hill this weekend, getting a chance to get some competition in front of the SJU coaches and plenty of small-college ones as well.
Today’s team notebook features a pair of New Jersey programs, one District 1 program coming off a quicker-than-expect end to its 2013-14 season, and one Inter-Ac school whose coaching staff is building on its first year:
Brandon Cazan (with ball) is going to have to do a lot for Bishop Eustace this season. (Photo: Josh Verlin)
Bishop Eustace (N.J.)
Coming off a 20-win 2013-2014 season which featured wins against Paul VI (twice), Cherry Hill East, Camden High and Eastern, Bishop Eustace faces the challenge of replacing star point guard and University of Sciences commit Flo DaSilva.
“I mean, it’s rough losing Flo, he was our main player,” rising senior Brandon Cazan said. “He could do everything; he could score, dribble the ball and play for our defense.”
Last season, Eustace made it to the South Jersey Non-Public ‘A’ Semifinals, where they lost to eventual Tournament of Champions winner St. Joseph’s-Metuchen and Kentucky-bound forward Karl Towns.
Now, the Crusaders are left with the task of trying to rearrange their offense and get back to the success of a year ago.
“We are trying to become a different team without him, he was a different player,” Cazan said. “We are trying to become more of a 3-point threat.”
Change is not always a bad thing, especially in Cazan’s case. As a junior starter last season Cazan played on the inside for Bishop Eustace. This year he is transitioning into a new role in the offense.
“I’ve worked my game to try and become a small forward on the perimeter and on-the-ball a little more,” he said. “I’m looking forward to it.”
Rising junior Mike Cohen will be the guy the Crusaders will look to in taking over the point guard spot this season. Cazan had high praise for the guard.
“He is doing a great job right now he’s passing the ball and getting great shots, attacking the basket and playing great ‘D,’” he said.
Cazan has been in share of emotional victories as a Crusader including handing Paul VI their first loss of the season. He talks about the key to having the same success this season.
“Making sure our defense is solid. Last year we beat [Paul VI] because of defense and Camden Catholic so we are working on making sure our defense is strong as it was last year so we can keep our wins up,” Cazan said. –David Hassinger
Penn Wood’s Malik Jackson was the leading scorer in Delaware County last season. (Photo: Josh Einbinder-Schatz)
Penn Wood (Pa.)
Last year’s Penn Wood Patriots seemed to be living up to expectations, after a win over Chichester in mid-January moved them to 10-1 on the season. The wheels fell off from there though, as the Patriots limped to a 6-7 finish before bowing out to Methacton in the District 1 AAAA play-back round.
Penn Wood loses some size from that team, with 6-7 Naeem East, 6-6 Amadou Kaba and 6-4 Jeff Padilioni all graduating. However, they return their most important piece: senior guard Malik Jackson, the leading scorer in Delaware County last year.
Head coach Clyde Jones, who has been coaching at Penn Wood since 2006, understands what needs to change in order for his team to make a deeper postseason run in the coming season.
“I think in a lot of cases last year, after we got to 10-1, our kids thought that we’d arrived, and that mindset permeated itself throughout the program through the rest of the season,” Jones said. “So hopefully with this young group, and being lead by Josh [Scott] and Malik, they’ll understand the importance of continuing to play hard and listen and allow themselves to be coached.”
The Patriots demonstrated a new style of play on Saturday at St. Joes. With Jackson sitting out with an injury, they trotted out a balanced lineup featuring no player taller than 6-4. This group took on an undermanned Friends Central team and effortlessly worked the ball around for wide open layups en route to a 30-plus point victory.
Moving forward without East and Kaba, Jones knows that this is how his team will need to play.
“We’re actually enjoying, for the first time in a while, playing some small ball. We’re learning. We’re trying a bunch of different stuff to hopefully accentuate the talent we have,” he said.
While contributions from inexperienced players like Chris Pierre and Ahmad Smalls (Class of 2016 and 2017, respectively) will be necessary, it will fall on the backcourt of Jackson and fellow senior Addison “Josh” Scott to lead this team to a deep postseason run. Their coach is confident that they can handle the responsibility.
“Those two guys, they’re built for it,” Jones said. “They’re built for it. Now we’re really depending on them to lead these young guys in their work habits, and just a whole lot of things. I think they’re gonna do pretty well.” –Ari Rosenfeld
Cherry Hill West forward Can (“Jon”) Oztamur is a tenacious inside scorer. (Photo: Josh Verlin)
Cherry Hill West (N.J.)
The 2013-2014 season moved Cherry Hill West a step in the right in the direction. Under head coach Hasmisi Tarrant, the Lions were able to earn themselves a playoff victory against Clearview. Now with playoff experience under their belt, the Lions look to push forward into this season with guys they know they can count on.
Not all of that experience was able to make it down to Saint Joseph’s, however.
“We bring back four starters,” Tarrant said. “Right now, even though we are experienced, we got a couple guys banged up–two of our starters are missing–but we still have our point guard who is all-conference in Elijah Bey, and Can Oztamur, an all-conference forward.”
Bey and Oztamur are both rising seniors and capable scorers who can make plays all over the court. At St. Joe’s, Bey’s jump shot looked smooth and natural and he hit multiple 3-point shots in a win over Philly Electric.
Oztamur is a 6-5 forward who knows score from anywhere on the court, though he’s an especially effective scorer within 10 feet of the rim.
Bey and Oztamur were key contributors to last season team and are the reason Tarrant believes this Cherry Hill West will be different than the team in years past.
“I think scoring would probably be the strength for us, which is new for our program,” he said. “Because usually we struggle to score. I think length–if we get all our guys back we start 6-3 6-4 and 6-5–so if those things come together, we run offense like I hope we do, than we should be pretty good scoring the ball.”
The Lions, like most teams, value the half-court offensive set and Tarrant finds this crucial to his team’s success.
“I wanna get better at running a half-court offense,” he said. “Our transition offense sets up our half court. So if we can beat the other team down the court, and run things off of that and get our reads, and understand where the ball should go, and not allow the ball to stick, we should be in a good situation. –David Hassinger
Malvern Prep’s Chris Anderson (above, right) and his Friar teammates are adapting to head coach Jon Harmatuk’s uptempo system. (Photo: Josh Verlin)
Malvern Prep (Pa.)
The 2013-14 season was certainly a learning process for the Friars, for a variety of reasons. Of their top seven scorers, only one (Andy Pancoast) was a senior, with most of the rotation in their first season at the varsity level. One of those seven, junior forward Jack Doherty, was playing his first year of organized high school basketball at any level.
And they all had to adjust to a brand new way of playing the game.
Second-year head coach John Harmatuk, a Texas native who coached in the Houston area for 16 years before moving up to Philadelphia last summer, got the Malvern job following Jim Rullo’s move to Neumann University. He brought with him his run-and-gun style from the Lone Star State, an interesting contrast for a league that usually features long possessions and low-scoring affairs.
“Definitely improvements, but we weren’t fully there,” rising senior guard Chris Anderson said. “We were still young, didn’t have a lot of experience, but next year we should be ready.”
That young rotation finished the year with an 11-16 record, including a 3-7 mark in Inter-Ac play, where each of the six teams play each other twice. That was an improvement from Rullo’s last season, where they went 1-9 in the Inter-Ac (9-20 overall), but clearly leaves room for growth.
In some ways, their game against Parkway in the SJU team camp was somewhat symbolic of the team’s path the last year. They struggled at first, as Parkway took a one-point lead into the half, but ended up forcing more turnovers and hitting open shots to win the game by a 32-point margin.
“It’s definitely better,” Anderson said. “It was hard to adapt to his new system because it was different at first, but I think we’re adjusting well. We played pretty good there, we’re trying to figure things out on this team.”
Aside from Pancoast, the Friars bring back the rest of the rotation, including Anderson, Doherty, and classmate Joey Fitzpatrick; plus rising juniors Will Powers, Chance DiFebbo. and Brent Greeley.
There are a few newcomers who are likely to earn minutes as well. A pair of rising sophomores, Tommy Wolf and Jalen Wade, both played well in the win over Parkway. Wolf, a 5-11 point guard, gives Harmatuk a true drive-and-kick PG to help space out his shooters. Wade is a 6-3 wing who adds some much-needed size to the rotation.
“They should be key role players for our season,” Anderson said. “Obviously they don’t have experience, so [this summer] just get them to play, mesh with us, come in and have some solid minutes for us.” –Josh Verlin
