Highland 46, Lower Cape May 38

What I'm listening to: Pink Floyd... Tracy Chapman... Liz Phair... the Beatles... Johnny Cash... the Cars... the Talking Heads... Company (the Sondheim musical)... Jimi Hendrix...

C-P sports copy deskman Aaron Bracy requested that I rip his editing job so that he could see his name in lights, so even though I haven't read what he did to my game story yet, I'll oblige him: I apologize to all my readers for the piece of crap that appeared in print underneath my byline in the March 1 paper, and especially to the Lower Cape May and Highland folks who hoped for so much better. I feel compelled to mention that the story was a thing of beauty until a certain unnamed copy editor's ham-fisted ministrations transformed it into a gutless blob of inky pulp. It deserved better, and so did you.

It was so strange to see Jessica Leoni and Denise Hemerka play today, because I remember them both from two years ago, the last time I covered a lot of girls' basketball. They've both come such a long way. When Leoni was a sophomore and Hemerka a freshman, they were in the sometimes-uncomfortable position of being nice young players on a court full of superstars, which made them targets every time they touched the ball. But I can't help thinking that all the big games alongside those stars tempered the younger players, helping turn them into the fierce and confident ballers I watched tonight.

Here are some stat lines that didn't make it into the story that will be in tomorrow's paper: Hemerka had four points, three assists, seven boards and three steals. Jessica McDevitt had 12 points for the Tartans, adding five boards , an assist and a block. For Lower, Stephanie Agger had 16 points, four steals, five rebounds and two assists.

I was very happy to see Lower before the season ended, and Agger in particular. She's a terrific talent with one more season to get everything figured out. The Tigers are a very solid team, and will certainly improve. Unfortunately, there's another undersized, all-underclassman team in their own division: Ocean City. I think Agger can be a bigger factor than any one Red Raider, but OC have themselves figured out a little better. I'm going to have to try to get down to see an OC-LCM game next year, possibly hitting the boards for some pizza beforehand.

It was also good to meet Roy Wright for the first time. I know a lot of coaches I trust have the greatest respect for him and what he's getting done at Lower. A playoff berth is a great first step, and if Wright is in for the long haul there, he should do well.

I've also been impressed with what Dan McGettigan has been able to do with Highland this year. The Tartans have improved as the year has gone on, which is a sure sign of a good coaching job. After the Steele-Hemerka years and the one-year Zoll whirlwind, a lot of folks seemed to believe he was just along for the ride, and I'll admit I had my doubts about what would happen to the program. But though Highland isn't a Top 5 regular, a win over Pinelands could get the Tartans back in the T20. And it's hard to argue with their second-half results. They went 4-4 the first time through the Trico Royal and 6-2 the second time through.

I have little or no idea what Pinelands is about, but I'll be rooting for Highland on Thursday.

The other games went basically as expected tonight. Jessica Gerald bolstered her All-SJ case with another awesome game, and I think she's probably at least a second-teamer now, no matter what happens at Cumberland Thursday. That will be a real moment of truth for the Colts, who beat Kingsway 51-49 a month ago, when the Dragons weren't breathing nearly the fire they are now.

That's it for me tonight. I'll be at Sterling-Glassboro tomorrow night. Cant' wait. See you there.

Washington Twp. 54, Mainland 48

Just a reminder, this post will also appear at Girls' Hoop Scoop, available through the official C-P website. I haven't yet decided whether to eventually post there exclusively. For now, the same material appears both places.

What I'm listening to: Paul Simon... Van Morrison... Jethro Tull... Coldplay... Ben Folds... Loudon Wainwright... Suzanne Vega... Jay-Z... Dar Williams...

I can imagine the consternation Karl Geisinger must have felt when he saw the brackets and realized he and his team had a first-round road trip to Washington Township. Karl has always been one of the most outspoken coaches in the area in saying the game is called differently -- and subsequently played differently -- in the western part of SJ than it is at the shore. After watching tonight's game, it's hard to know what to say. It's not as if Washington Township is a particularly un-physical team, but Lauren McPeak couldn't stay on the court even half the game and she still fouled out. I wouldn't have said the play was overly rough, and yet there were a total of 51 foul shots taken. It was not a pretty game by a long shot, and if pressed, I would say that Mainland played better basketball for most of the time, with the third quarter and the last minute being big exceptions.

If you're Karl or any other coach who perceives himself to be in that situation, it begs the question: Do you tell the kids to play conservative defense, knowing the game is going to be called a certain way? Or do you just tell them to play their style and let the chips fall where they may? If you take the first option, you risk taking your team out of its head right out of the gate, and if you take the second, all you'll walk out of the gym with is your principles and a long wait till next year.

Washington Township shot 33 foul shots today, including 18 in the fourth quarter, despite the fact that Mainland only fouled for possession in the last couple of minutes. The Mustangs shot 18 themselves, including eight in the fourth. Washington Township certainly deserves credit for taking advantage -- the Maids were 15-for-18 from the line in the fourth -- and the home team was clutch in the last minutes, with a couple of heads-up plays by Amanda "Kool-Aid" Jennings and Kristen Petell. I just wonder what might have happened in this game if McPeak could have stayed on the floor. Donna Costa is pushing hard for Jennings to be an All-SJ pick at the end of the year based partially on the fact that she's played and defended so many taller girls. She's certainly right about the fact that Jennings does a great job for her size, but it wasn't anyone's defense that took McPeak out of the game tonight.

I was once again impressed with the Wert twins, who have to mentioned in any best-freshman conversation, along with Frazier from Spirit, Price-Perry from Lindenwold and a bunch of other girls I can't think of right now. They get tougher on the defensive end all day, and the three foul shots Dana hit in the second quarter were Township's only points. As a tandem, them made zero field goals, but went 11-for-12 from the line, grabbed three big boards, made six steals and added an assist. Washington Township is set at guard for the next three years, so maybe the young talent will funnel back to Gloucester Catholic.

I was sad to see the careers of Carlee Briglia and Sarah Cohen end. Both of those players are extremely tough, and a lot of fun to watch. Mainland will be back next year, though, especially with its whole frontcourt returning. Wooding and Bradway were both very solid for the 'Stangs tonight.

I got back to the office to find that Sterling survived the Pleasantville test, and I'll see the Knights on Wednesday at Glassboro. Laura Sweeney won her final battle with Elise Graham and Cherokee advanced to meet Gami. A Catanzariti-less Cinnaminson escaped a challenge from Point Boro. I know she hasn't been in the box scores for the last couple of week, but I don't know why. Anyone who wants to shed light on that can email me or comment. Haddon Township earned a shot at Heights. When the teams played a couple of weeks ago, Casey Orlando was a big factor. We'll see if somebody else steps up for the Garnets.

I'll be at LCM-Highland tomorrow. I haven't seen either of these teams play yet, so I figured I'd take this final shot at both of them. Stephanie Agger gets a lot of respect from the coaches in the Cape, and Jessica Leoni has had a nice year for the Tartans, so it should be interesting.

See you there.

Strength of Schedule rankings

What I'm listening to: the Kinks... W.A. Mozart... 50 Cent... Randy Newman... Ash... James Brown...

Back in the fall, I cooked up a mathematical system for the calculation of schedule strength. With a little tweaking, it works for basketball too. I've copied and pasted the following explanation from the boys' soccer blog, changing a few words to make it relevant to this basketball season:

I couldn't sleep last night, and while I was lying there staring at the ceiling, I devised a relatively simple formula for calculating strength of schedule for SJ high school basketball, or really for any other sport in this area. Then once I came up with that, I really couldn't sleep until I'd done the math on all 88 major-conference teams in South Jersey.

I blame this illness of mine on my father. He has it too.

Anyway, here's the formula. Remember that it only measures the strength of a team's schedule (S.O.S), with no regard for wins, losses and ties. So it's not a ranking of teams so much as of the test each team has faced over the course of the season.

Here goes:

Working with the current Top 20, past Top 20s, the current list of bubble teams, the Gannett state Top 20 and the USA Today Top 25, point values are assigned to each opponent a particular team has faced.
5 -- Teams ranked from 1-5 in the C-P are worth
4 -- Teams ranked 6-10
3 -- 11-15
2 -- 16-20
1 -- "Almost" teams from the last two weeks, as well as squads that used to be ranked in the T20 but aren't anymore.

For instance, a game against Absegami is worth 5 points because the Braves are ranked in the Top 5. A game against Eastern is worth 1 because the Vikings used to be ranked.

For out-of-area opponents:
7 points -- USA Today Top 25
6 points -- USA Today Regional Top 10
5 points -- Gannett state ranking 1-10
4 points -- Gannett state ranking 11-20
3 points -- Any noteworthy out-of-area team, i.e. recent state champion, state title contender or major private school porgram
1 point -- Any out-of-area team with a winning record

For example, Willingboro gets 7 points for playing Shabazz (nationally ranked). Eustace gets 3 points for playing St. John Vianney (noteworthy out-of-area team). Gami gets 6 points for playing Bishop McNamara (ranked in the East region), and Camden Catholic gets 5 points for playing Bloomfield Tech. The out-of-area criteria for boys' soccer was way simpler, but I felt I needed to articulate it further in girls' hoops because there are so many more of those showcase event giving, and therefore a lot more games involving out-of-area heavyweights.

I hope that was clear enough.

Anyway, here are the top 25 teams on S.O.S. and their point totals:

1. Wilson 79
2. CCath 55
3. Gami 53
T4. Paul VI 52
T4. Camden 52
6. Willingboro 50
T7. Eustace 45
T7. Spirit 45
T7. Wash Twp. 45
T7. AC 45
11. Cherokee 44
T12. Eastern 42
T12. Mainland 42
14. Penn Tech 41
15. Lenape 40
T16. CH East 39
T16. EHT 39
T16. Pennsauken 39
19. Oakcrest 38
20. Moorestown 35
21. Camden County Tech 34
22. Lower Cape May 33
23. Shawnee 32
T24. Haddonfield 31
T24. Middle 31
T24. RV
T24. Seneca

Other T20 teams:

T28. Ocean City 30
T32. Pleasantville 27
T35. Wildwood Cath. 25
T40. Timber Creek 23
T51. Sterling 18
T68. Heights 14
T73. Glassboro 13

This is little more than an exercise, of course, and it doesn't really mean anything. A couple of trends that were at work here. Obviously, being in the Olympic National is money as far as SOS. I'm sure Camden would prefer not to be in the top 5 in this ranking, since it's not so much fun for the Panthers. Wilson's schedule looks better and better, more than 20 points clear of second place. There wasn't any one division that was abjectly weak, but

Anyway, take from the list what you like. As I said, it means nothing, but it's a fun thing to think about, at least for me. I started thinking about a way to use a similiar model to actually rank teams, but that's dangerous ground. It could be done, but I'm not sure anybody would like the result any more than I like the BCS in college football, which is not at all.

New C-P T20

What I'm listening to: Regina Spektor... TMBG... Renaissance... Dar Williams... the Pogues... Mama Mia... Gatan Project...

1. CCath
2. Wilson
3. Spirit
4. Gami
5. Boro
6. AC
7. OC
8. Eustace
9. PVI
10. Wash Twp.
11. RV
12. Cherokee
13. TCreek
14. CH East
15. Pleasantville
16. Heights
17. Glassboro
18. Sterling
19. Wildwood Cath.
20. Wildwood

Almost: Sacred Heart, Moorestown, Williamstown, Cumberland, Kingsway, Gloucester, Haddonfield, Collingswood, Pennsauken, Salem, Highland

I had a real problem in the Top 5 for the first time in about a month, because of Gami's loss to Spirit. Knowing that Rosario and James were out, there's obviously room to assume that they might have been able to make a difference. But I've always said that the team that plays is the team that plays, and I've dropped other teams for losing at less than full strength, so I didn't feel like I could just give the Braves a pass for convenience's sake.

I've had it really easy with the top part of the list for quite a while, and it came back on my this time, bot just with Gami but also with Cherry Hill East. I'm sure it hasn't escaped the Cougars' notice that they're ranked behind a team in Washington Township which they beat twice, and also behind another team, Cherokee, which is a member of a division which East won outright. But something went horribly wrong for that team in a 20+ point loss at Timber Creek. Maybe it's some kind of Player of the Week curse. It wasn't more than a few hours after I talked to Kim Keyack to make Vianca Tejada the POW that the Cougars laid that egg. I wasn't worried about the pick because, since we have to choose the player by a certain time, I considered the "week" to run from Thursday to Wednesday. But still, it was quite a surprise.

I wondered for a while what to do with the end of the rankings as well. I decided that the winner of the Trico championship game would be in no matter what, and had Williamstown won, I would have put Mainland back in too. Wildwood Catholic effectively replaced Sacred Heart by virtue of a win over the Lions on the road. I realize that the division was actually not up for grabs, that SH already had it locked away, but that was a big win for the Crusaders, who seem to be headed in the right direction going into the playoffs. The near upset over Paul VI the very next day only solidified those thoughts in my head. Wildwood went in at No. 20, based on a six-game win streak that includes victories over Gloucester, Pitman and Mainland, but it could just as easily have been any one of four or five other teams.

I've worked up strength-of-schedule rankings for the whole area, and I'll be posting about them sometime tomorrow (Sunday), along with an explanation of the formula. There were some interesting revelations.

Kingsway 56, Moorestown 49

Invariably, I write these blog posts while connected ears-first to my iPod, so here's a new regular feature that I'm sure will serve to embarass me. I'm calling it "What I'm listening to." I'll try to be honest, even if Barry Manilow happens to come up.

In any case, listen along if you like...

What I'm listening to: Ben Folds (Rockin' the Suburbs)... DMX... Van Morrison... Pink Floyd... James Brown...

I enjoyed seeing my former editor and boss, Diane Fuhrer, at the game tonight. Her daughter is a freshman for the Quakers, though she's currently injured. She started with the same talk that all basketball parents spout in some form -- you know: "this player should be starting instead of that player," and "why weren't you here last night?" and so on and so forth -- but she kept catching herself. It was funny because she was on the other end of lots of crazy phone calls from parents when she was the C-P sports editor.

It was an enjoyable game to watch. Not too many unforced turnovers, some good ball movement, solid defense and few first-half fouls. Both teams were dead tired and maybe that helped everybody keep it under control. Jessica Gerald was at another level, and she's gotten a lot of "best player faced" votes on the all-star ballots we've been getting back from area coaches. I think she's probably had the best year in the Trico this season, and that puts her right in the middle of All-SJ consideration. I'll have to think about that some more, though.

Both Kingsway have interesting first-round home games in the playoffs, and if they get through, I could see either of them upsetting the high seeds they'll face next. Kingsway gets Hammonton, with the winner going to Cumberland. Moorestown hosts Deptford, with the victor going down to Ocean City. As I've mentioned before, the possible duel between Gerald and Hammonton's Katie Piekielski will be worth the rpice of admission, but I was very impressed with how Kingsway's supporting cast has come along. Moorestown seemed the wearier team today, even though they were at home. If that's true, and they get back to full strength for Deptford, the Quakers will be a clear favorite in that game. Then they'll certainly have a chance against OC, especially if the Red Raiders suffer the same brand of shooting woes they faced against Trenton Central last weekend.

It's kind of a shame that the basketball squad doesn't get more lacrosse players out for the team, but I guess the laxers wouldn't be a top-three national program year after year if those athletes weren't training hard for that sport through at least one of the other two seasons. I'm really looking forward to watching Xan Weitzel, Jess Davis, Brooke Cantwell, Erika Page and the rest of the Quakes take on top-ranked Mt. Hebron of Maryland at home this spring. Kara Burnham and Julie McGrory and the rest of the Moorestown hoops team does a great job for coach Scott Atkinson, but at a lot of schools, basketball has its pick of the student body's best female athletes. The only lax name I recognized today was Virginia Weber.

When I got back to the office tonight, I got a call from Haddon Heights coach Kenny Hamburger, who reported that junior center Casey Orlando tore some ankle ligaments agains Collingswod and will be out the rest of the season. I know the Garnets aren't the deepest team around, but now we'll find out just how shallow they are. And now Sam Carter really needs to come to play, because that's a lot of boards and a decent number of points gone from the lineup. Unlike the extremely outspoken Heights parents, Kenny has downplayed his team all year, and tonight was no different. "This levels the playing field," he said. I didn't disagree with him, adding that the SJ Group 2 playing field was already pretty flat. But I wouldn't count Heights out yet. I still believe they have the best single player, at least as far as upside, in the sectional in Meredith Kennedy. There aren't many teams the Garnets can't beat if she's hot.

I also saw that Paul VI escaped Wildwood Catholic on a buzzer-beating putback by Mo Reilly. Had WWC held on there, that would have been two ranked upsets in two days. I think the Crusaders will be in the T20 come Monday despite the last-second loss anyway.

My amoeba-like weekend schedule has shifted again, and now I'm "off" tomorrow (Saturday). I say "off" because I still have to do basically all the work for a feature that will serve as the playoff preview, as well as figure out what the heck I'm going to do for my Monday column. On Sunday, I'm going backto visit one of my old beats, boys swimming, to cover the public state finals. Charlie Sprang is off in Indiana watching his son swim in the Big Ten championships, so we all need to pitch in. The playoffs kick off the next day and right now the plan is for me to cover Mainland-Washington Township, with Lower Cape May-Highland on tap for Tuesday. Wednesday I'll likely be at Glassboro to see the Bulldogs take on the Pleasantville-Sterling winner, and Thursday's frontrunner is Timber Creek-Wilson, since it's a rematch of last year's final. Those certainly won't be the only GB games the C-P wll cover, but I'm not sure where other folks are going to be.

Anyway, check back tomorrow and Sunday for the new T20 and something special I'm still working on. Those who followed the boys' soccer season might be able to guess what it is, but the only hint I'll give is that it's one of the more interesting products of my obsessive personality.

Camden Catholic 63, Absegami 58

My dad gave me a call a couple of days ago and said, "If I only see one girls' basketball game this year, which one should I go to?"

There was only one answer to that question, and the CC-Gami game fulfilled all expectations. My dad drove down with me, and it was great to have him, but I'm afraid he's probably now got an unrealistic impression of what girls' basketball is all about. Maybe I'll bring him to the Tournament of Champions. Otherwise, his next GB experience is likely to be a disappoinment.

That's not to say that the game was perfect, but the two teams play a version of the game that is recognizable to anyone as good basketball, and they both have girls who can make plays that would be impressive at any level. The atmosphere was great, which certainly helped, and since my dad wasn't even sure how to pronounce Absegami, he was happy to see the Irish come back and win.

To be honest, though, I find myself kind of ambivalent about the outcome. I though Gami played a great game, and was a little sad to see them lose. The Braves deserved better, especially playing without Rosario. They made no excuses, and Jasmine Crew's 21 second-half points was certainly the decisive force in the game, but I was incredibly impressed with Mostafa, Booker and especially Connie James, who made a ton of foul shots and played great defense on a sprained ankle.

Catholic did not play well in the first half. In fact, I thought the first was a "nervoud quarter' for both teams. Since they were at home, it was not a shock the Gami shook off the nerves first, but I'm not sure CC has scored as few as four points in any quarter all season, and the Irish looked just that out-of-sync. Crew was taking bad shots, Matera was invisible, Ra was having trouble finishing. The only thing that was working was the rebounding, thanks in large part to Allison Lane. It's hard to know how many of those boards Rosario would have grabbed, but Lane certainly uses her body as well as enybody in South Jersey. She reminds me of Kelsey McGowan of Sterling in that way: not too tall, but a great rebounder.

Mostafa took everybody's breath away several times, an I'm more anxious than ever to see the player she might be able to turn into. Her reverse layup in the second quarter served notice that she's not just tall, she didn't pick up a foul until the second half despite playing great defense, and she was efficient from the foul line. In fact, I daresay she was the best center on the court for much of the game.

But in the second half, Crew started playing under control, taking good shots, and everything loosened up. As tight as the Irish were in the first half, that's how loose they were by the end of the game. I mean a 26-point fourth quarter? That's kind of ridiculous. CC scored all of 15 points in the first half and 48 points in the second. I thought coming in that they had to turn up the pace a little bit on Gami, and they definitely did as the game wore on.

I know that folks are going to get on Alysha Taylor for having an imperfect game, but I really don't think she played badly. She's a little out of position as a point guard, sure, but Gami didn't give the game away, the Irish took it. In talking to Mostafa after the game, I feel like the Braves understand that they played well, and I really hope that's true.

The injury situation with Roasario and James shakes out this way, according to coach Greg Goodwin: both have sprained ankles, Rosario's sustained on Monday against Christ the King. Both will be shut down now until the first game of the playoffs, against either Cherokee or Pennsauken next Wednesday, so niether figures to be in the lineup for Saturday's CAL championship game against Holy Spirit. Goodwin said he learned his lesson a couple years ago, when his team was banged up late in the season and they played through it, only to be upset by Toms River North in the sJ Group 4 final. "Kara Ayers was in a cast the next day," he said, which is something I did not know, but it certainly explains some things. So Gami is playing it safe the rest of the way. They may go into the playoffs with an inexplicable five losses if the Spartans can pull the upset at Stockton, but health going into "the second season" is the highest priority. In related news, the AC Press reported that Spirit center Teena Marsh could be back in the lineup soon, which is great news. If she plays against Gami, the absence of Rosario will be that much more important.

Tomorrow (Thursday) is my wife's 28th birthday, so I'll be out of the loop for an evening. Hopefully the world does not end. Friday I'll be at Kingsway-Moorestown. The Quakers are one of a few teams I am hell-bent on seeing before this is all over. I have a strategy for getting to the others next week.

A humble and hopeful suggestion

As mentioned at the end of the previous post, this idea belonged first to Williamstown coach and first-rate basketball fan Karen Dilmore, but I've decided to throw whatever meager weight I have behind it:

Wouldn't it be fun to see AC's Tasha Cannon and Woodbury's sensational junior Shannon Gantt play one-on-one? Maybe on the day of the Al Carino All-Star Game? I'd certainly pay for the chance. Tasha could wear the awesome mohawk she was rocking on Sunday at Ventnor, and it would give Gantt some much-deserved spotlight. In some ways, I wonder what her career would be like if she had transferred to a Catholic school, maybe GC or Paul VI, but on the other hand, I applaud her sticking with her program. In any case, she might be the only female player I know of in SJ who could stay with Tasha in that particular setting.

So I'm starting the drum beat now. I have a feeling both players would be game, as long as the opportunity presented itself conveniently. The Carino game seems the most likely possibility since Cannan will probably be there anyway and it's relatively close to Gantt's Woodbury home. Plus the season will be over, nothing else will be on the line, a large section of the community will be there anyway and maybe it brings a couple more people in the door for an event that supports the basketball club. I can't imagine either of those girls backing down from a friendly challenge.

So here it is: Game to 15 by ones, make-it-take-it, for the unofficial one-on-one championship of South Jersey. If they want, I'll even come up with a trophy of some sort. Hopefully the idea gathers some momentum. I think it's cool.

Williamstown 48, Cumberland 43

This game definitely exceeded expectations as far as intensity and entertainment value. The way Williamstown had been struggling to score the last few weeks, Rachael Matreale's out-of-the-blue 25-point explosion was a welcome shock. At least to me.

Everybody seemed to have a lot of fun last night, especially when the Braves boys team showed up in the fourth quarter. Cumberland made its runs beyond Pariphany Pender and Keyona Grant, but Williamstown handled things just a tiny bit better. I was happy to see them earn a share of the Royal title because, for the vast majority of the season, they had to deal with the pressure of being the favorite and the frontrunner. Everybody brings their best game to play the favorite.

One trivial question that's been tugging at me: why does Williamstown wear blue shorts with home white jerseys? Is it a statement of some kind, or did the budget only allow for one set of shorts? If it's the budget, I certainly think they made the right choice, as blue jerseys with white shorts on the road wouldn't be a great look.

And since I got on the subject of gyms the other day, I might as well mention that Williamstown has a nice one. I especially enjoy the arena-style scoreboard above the court. The place gets pretty full for the SJ Group 4 and 2 title games, which are held there every year, though I'm a little surprised they've kept on with that now that Williamstown has moved into Group 4. The Braves could concievably reach the sectional final on their home floor. The Group 3/1 site for the last few years has been Cherry Hill East, so they couldn't just switch the two since East is even more likely than Williamstown to be in the Group 4 sectional final. They used to have the 3/1 doubleheader all the way down at Woodstown, and while I liked the atmosphere down there, I wasn't crazy about the drive. Cherry hill East is nice and close, and if they ever move the other game out of Williamstown, I hope it goes someplace like, say, Camden Catholic. There's nothing like a 45-second drive to the office when you're in a tight deadline jam. Of course, the biggest problem venue is the Non-Public sectional finals, which are always all the way out at Lakewood in Ocean County. Not only is it far, but there's really no fast way to get there.

But enough of my whining.

I talking with folks after the game, I was really impressed with Pender. As her team's impromptu spokeswoman in defeat, she was a delightful interview: thoughtful, sincere, original and respectful of the victors without seeming condescending. It's often a tough trick for a high school kid to pull off, especially after a game as tough as last night's, and she did it with aplomb. It sort of makes me hope Cumberland has a long enough tournament run for me to cover them again, because now I know I'll get decent Parsiphany quotes every time. A quick glance at the bracket would have the Colts likely hosting Wilson in the sectional semis, and that would also explain the presence of coach Al Dyer in the gym last night. I'm sure that will be a good game, but it might be too much orange for me to handle. We'll see.

As long as I'm thinking about Williamstown, I might as well pass along a terrific suggestion made by Braves coach Karen Dilmore. But on second thought, the idea is good enough that it deserves a post of its own...

New C-P T20

1. CC
2. Gami
3. Wilson
4. Spirit
5. Boro
6. AC
7. RV
8. OC
9. Eustace
10. PVI
11. East
12. Cumberland
13. Wash. Twp.
14. Cherokee
15. SHeart
16. Pleasantville
17. Heights
18. Sterling
19. TCreek
20. Moorestown

Almost: Collingswood, Cinnaminson, EHT, Glassboro, Gloucester, Haddonfield, Mainland, Pennsauken, Wildwood, WW Cath, Williamstown

I'm in Ventnor and it's almost halftime of the OC-Trenton Central game right now, the Raiders down by seven but in the game. The wireless signal here is kind of spotty, so I need to keep this short.

As you can see, the top 15 did not change one iota. I agonized over whether to drop Timber Creek or Moorestown for losing games to superior teams, but eventually decided against it. Sterling jumped in for beating Colls soundly on the road. Glassboro was probably the next team in based on an impressive three-loss record, but the Bulldogs still haven't beaten a ranked team so I demurred there.

I just got done watching Eustace lose to Vianney by 18, but I have to say the Crusaders showed themselves to be a much-improved team from the beginning of the season. I was particularly impressed with Claybrook. A point guard has to take her share of the blame when a team commits nearly 30 turnovers, but that was a collective effort. The real difference in the game was the fact that SJV went 9-for-13 from three. That's an owwie every single time, especially since BE's interior D was playing very tough.

After that, Willingboro survived a game with Bishop Kearney, a team from NY. For the life of me, I can't figure out how that team stayed with the Chimeras, but they did. The Boro was too physical in the end, though.

That's it for now. I'll try to post tomorrow, if I get a chance.

Sterling 38, Colls 28

This post will also appear on the official C-P site. Feel free to visit there as well. This blog will eventually be phased out in favor of the official one, but I'll let you all know when it stops being current.

So the Colonial drama is at an end, at least for the regular season.

Some of the Haddon Heights contingent was on hand at Collingswood, having already taken care of business against Gateway. I think a group of them walked into the gym about 50 feet behind me and waved to me, but it was one of those moments where you think, "Are they waving to me or to someone else?" And I'm afraid I might have come off badly there. To be honest, that happens to me a lot. I never think anyone is waving to me. Why would they be? I wish I were the kind of person who is always expecting to be recognized and waved to, but I'm afraid I never will be. In any case, I apologize for seeming stand-offish.

And congratulations to Heights for securing a piece of the conference title. I expect that the Garnets will earn it all on Tuesday, but stranger things have happened. Though it would be crazy for West Deptford to throw the Colonial back into play, I can't help hoping it doesn't. Unless I'm not counting right, two Heights losses (to WD and Colls) next week could leave four teams with four losses each. What kind of league championship would it be if they split it four ways. I can tell you it would be a happy day at the old championship jacket-selling store.

As far as thrills go, this afternoon was a little bit of a disappointment. Collingswood was flat all afternoon, and Sterling was certainly on its game better. The Knights didn't light up the scoreboard, but Cassi Bryant's defense on Lauren Gregg set a very serious tone. The game was over after three quarters.

I wish the best of luck to Sterling coach Kate McDonald, whose baby girl is due on Monday. My sister very recently had a baby. I'm sure her whole family is excited, and the SJ basketball family has something to gain here too. As she told me today, she may be giving birth to the future of her program. Who knows? Hopefully Saturday won't be the last I see of her this season, as her team has a chance to go deep into SJ Group 2. In fact, I'm not sure there's a team that's clearly playing better than Sterling right now, but Pleasantville-Glassboro-Haddonfield is a very tough road to the sectional final.

I have to cut this short if I stand any chance of catching Eustace-Vianney down at Ventnor, which is my plan. I have to get to work on a bunch of other things tomorrow as well, including a pre-playoff feature story on the best centers around. I really want to get a bunch of them together for a photo, but I'm not sure how possible that it. We'll see.

Delran 42, West Tech 41

This post will also appear on the official C-P site. Feel free to visit there as well. This blog will eventually be phased out, but I'll let you all know when it stops being current.

West Tech might be the best story of the year. Dyette Dillard is really building something at that school, which might turn out to be South Jersey's answer to Bloomfield Tech. Especially with the finalncial crisis that the school district of Willingboro is facing these days, I think a lot of students are going to be looking hard at Westampton Tech as an option, not just for basketball reasons.

The future may belong to these Panthers, but the day did not.

Delran did an excellent job attacking. The aggressiveness of Ally Rodolico and Caitlyn Simmons did a lot to neutralize the physical advantages that West Tech had, and the Panthers' cold shooting did the rest of the job.

Big Joe from Collingswood was in the house, scouting West Tech. He was rightly concerned about the game the Colls might get, should they advance past Buena. He characterized them as "Lindenwold with a couple of 6-footers" and I think that's apt. The guards really attack the basket, and aggression goes a long way in the girls game. I didn't get a chance to talk with Joe afterwards, so I'm not sure what the final analysis was, but I'm sure he'll deliver a comprehensive report to Nancy O'Neill. Dyette and I joked that it was good her team didn't really show Joe everything they had, but I know from talking to him at halftime that he was suitably impressed, and he's certainly seen enough basketball to know what a team is capable of, no matter what it shows over a given 32 minutes.

The end of the game was a little disconcerting to me, with regard to both teams. Delran tried to give the game away with turnovers, and while I felt bad for one girl in particular, they need to take care of the basketball in those situations. West Tech's cold shooting made certain they didn't take advantage of those mistakes, but what really confised me was the defenses they were in late. Down a point in the last two minutes, they were in a sagging box-and-one zone with Rodolico isolated. Now Rodolico was having a great game, but if I'm Delran I'll take that trade every time. They threw the ball away anyway, but I know a lot of teams that have seen that defense and never given the ball back to West Tech.

One strange thing: Delran was absolutely perfect from the foul line, 11-for-11, until the last minute, when Simmons missed the first end of a one-and-one. How ironic would it have been if the Bears would have lost the game at the line after nailing them all night long. I'll give Simmons a pass this time because she was money in a game I saw earlier in the season, against Cinnaminson, and I'm glad it didn't come back to bite the Bears.

As I mentioned I was going to do, I accompanied one of our interns to the Hammonton-Pennsauken game earlier in the day. There's some insurance-related reason that interns can't go anywhere by themselves, but it's a good way for us to make sure they're getting as much as possible out of their time with us, I guess. We decided to do the story on Elise Graham, so I was hoping for a good game out of her. After a slow start she came alive for 17 points, which was nice.

In my time at the C-P, I've covered tons of Pennauken events, but this is actually the first time I've ever been in the Pennsauken gymnasium. I was digging it. If you've never been, I'd describe it this way: imagine a warehouse, or better yet, a textile factory. Take out all the workers and machinery, replace them with some bleachers, a hardwood floor and some basketball goals and voila. Very industrial. Very cool. I can imagine a night game there -- with some strobe-lit, techno-enhanced introductions -- would be very intimidating to a visiting team. And just think of the nicknames you could come up with for it: the Factory, the Warehouse of Pain, the Sweatshop.

It was laid back afternoon at the old factory. That is, except if your name was Katie Piekielksi. Her shot wasn't on, but she played a great, hard-nosed game nonetheless. She made some great passes, grabbed some huge boards, and spent a lot -- and I do mean a lot -- of time on the floor. She even did a somersault once after getting a rebound that she hadno business getting.

It was good to talk to her after the game, if only to know that she wasn't hurt. She and the Blue Devils have a game against Kingsway coming up in the first round of the upcoming SJ G3 playoffs, and I'd bet that her duel with Jessica Gerald will be a bargain at twice the price. I haven't figured out the coverage strategy for the opening round of the playoffs yet, but I certainly wouldn't mind seeing that one.

I'm going to try to get down to the Timber Creek-Washington Township game early tomorrow afternoon, and do my Monday Sicth Man column on the Chargers, who lost teammate Brittany Washington to a car accident a year ago today (meaning Friday). Then I'll head to Sterling Collingswood to see if the Panthers can keep pace in the Colonial. If they win, I'll cover their game with Heights on Thursday. If not, I'll find some other game to see. Sunday I'm going down to Ventnor, though I realized after posting yesterday that the Eustace-Mainland game had been shuffled out of existence. I'm not certain which game I'm going to actually cover, but there are a ton of events in the area that day across all sports, so we're not sending a photographer down. That means I don't have to decide until I get down there. I may well end up covering Eustace-Vianney in the same time slot.

Lastly, I got a call from Greg Goodwin confirming the big game with CC on Wednesday night at 6. It should be a great atmosphere down at Gami, which happens to be another of SJ's interesting gyms. It's really big, and kind of dark and shadowey, which adds to the drama. I've never seen it even close to full, but the wrestling folks tell me that when it is, it really rocks. We'll find out, because I've spoken to a bunch of people who are planning on going down to watch. Hopefully, though, this is only Round 1, with the second round to come in the TOC.

Heights 45, Haddon Twp. 31

This post will also appear on the official C-P site. Feel free to visit there as well. This blog will eventually be phased out, but I'll let you all know when it stops being current.

So let's start with the topic that lots of folks are talking about, the Nora Murphy situation.

I knew the skeleton of the tale before walking into the Haddon Township gym, and I'm a bit more informed now, but the while thing still makes me shake my head a little bit. Murphy, the Hawks' junior point guard, left the team for personal reasons after the Paul VI game. After talking with Tommie Mulligan today, it seems like the parting was quasi-amicable, but considering the timing it's certainly unfortunate. One person I talked to made that very point, and I agree: with the playoffs just a couple weeks away, and your team in a bracket where a hot streak could end in a championship, why not just stick it out? Why not finish what you started, and then just stay home senior year? I can't imagine what the rest of the team must be thinking at this point. But if it were me, and my teammate did the same thing, I'd be angry.

I have a feeling the Haddon Township players feel that way, too. Here's a story: I was sitting amidst a bunch of Township students and when the game was getting away in the fourth quarter, they openly discussed the possibility of chanting, "Put Nora in," but then decided against it because the other players "would be so pissed." And this is coming from a group that had few qualms kicking sand on the line between humor and bad taste all evening, so I can only imagine the kind of venom flowing in the halls of that school.

This situation certainly says something about how things have changed. High school sports are an opportunity to represent more than yourself, to play for your school and, in many cases, your community. The rise of AAU and other outside interests has obviously had a negative effect on that. In the best-case scenario, I would think AAU would get the individual stuff out of the way, freeing kids to play a team game during the season. But it workd the opposite way. Players, and especially parents, expect the same ass-kissing from high school coaches that they get from coaches they're paying.

Unlike high school coaches, club and AAU coaches aren't in business to look after a whole human being's development. Hell, they're not even in business of winning games. If a coach gets a reputation for securing his players lots of positive exposure leading to scholarship offers, tournament victories don't even matter. High school coaches, on the other hand, have to keep the big picture in mind, both for the individual kids and for the program as a whole. Anybody who starts giving in to demands, substituting anyone else's judgments for his/her own, is making a deal with the devil. I can think of several coaches and programs who have begun to dance that number with varying degrees of success. I can think of some -- Haddon Township and Gloucester Catholic spring right to mind -- that have resisted, and some might say suffered for it.

It's a sign of the times. I didn't expect to sound so old so soon, but I can't help missing the good old days.

A quick rundown of some other observations from the game:

This was the most balanced game I've seen Haddon Heights play as far as contributions from all five starters. Casey orlando was money today, and Joslyn Eppright -- who scored a total of one point in the first two HH games I saw -- was knocking down shots.

Kennedy didn't have the best game I've seen, but it would have been hard for her to live up to what she's done other times I've seen her play. Carter played well in the second half, but she pulled one of her disappearing acts in the first.

I enjoyed the Haddon Township youth game at halftime, as did the Township students sitting behind me. Both the point guards were terrific for both teams, in a tiger-by-the-tail sort of way. One girl was a particularly aggressive offensive player, and the high school students started urging her to shoot every time she touched the ball. She usually caved. It was a running clock, and the "official" swallowed the whistle, which made everything more fun. A girl took a damn-near-halfcourt shot at the buzzer, and it damn near went in. Most of the gym was riveted to the game by then, and the place was ready to go berserk.

This may well have been the last time I'll see Haddon Township this season, so I wanted to say how impressed I've been with the progress of Colleen Greway. When the Hawks beat Haddonfield earlier this season, I made her a Player of the Week and, at the time, Tommie said she wasn't supposed to be one of the team's offensive focal points coming into the season. But she was their best player when I saw them play Sterling a couple of weeks ago, and she was unquestionably the leader of the team against Heights. The two passes she made late in the first half -- particularly the one in the last five seconds -- were pretty slick.

And finally, I got back to the office to find that Haddonfield lost at Sterling, leaving Heights at the top of the Colonial with two losses and Collingswood alone in second with three. That means that if the Colls beat Sterling on Saturday and no major upsets happen, the Panthers will play Heights for a share of the title on Thursday, and the Garnets will be playing to keep it all for themselves. If Sterling beat Collingswood Saturday, then Heights can lose once in the last week and still be the sole Colonial champ, with the Colls, Haddonfield and Sterling vying for second.

The only other two SJ divisions up for grabs are the ones in the Tri-County Conference. Cumberland pretty much has a piece of the Royal, with a chance to have it all in the event of a win over Williamstown this coming week. Glassboro is a game up on Wildwood, with very winnable games the rest of the way.

I'll be accompanying one of our interns to the Hammonton-Pennsauken game tomorrow afternoon so she can do a story on one of the Indians. Then I'm going to Delran-Westampton Tech. Saturday I'll be at the aforementioned Sterling-Collingswood game, and then Mainland-Eustace on Sunday down at the Ventnor City Shootout.

See you there.

Eastern, Winslow and Wednesday

First, some important news.

This blog has gotten the call. This means one of two things. Either it's about to be co-opted by Big Brother, subdued and homogonized, or (and I hope this is true) it's about to add a new, more complex shade to the C-P spectrum. In any case, the editors-that-be have requested that I start posting at a new site underneath the paper's umbrella.

The address: www.courierpostonline.com/blogs/mccann.html

I will continue to post here for a while, or at least copy and paste the posts at both sites so that no one will be left behind. Hopefully, the trasition will go smoothly. Eventually this blog -- and theoretically the Unofficial C-P Boys Soccer site as well -- will go dormant, and everything will appear at the new site. If things get too corporate over there, of course, I'll just switch back, but I'm willing to hope that it won't come to that.

In other news, many people I've talked to in person have mentioned difficulty placing comments on the site. I think I've figured this out, and one no longer has to be a blogger member to post a comment. Anonymous comments are now possible. Though I'd certainly prefer folks sign their names to their thoughts, I can certainly understand not wanting to go through the hassle of setting up a username and remembering a password. Hopefully, this improvement will work (just in time to be made obselete by the move to the new site).

In actual hoops news, I went to cover the Eastern-Winslow game yesterday. Though I don't have the energy to write a whole diatribe about this matchup, I will say that I expect both of these programs to improve by at least four or five wins next year.

Eastern looked good once the Vikings started hitting shots, and I really like Marissa DiMarco's intensity. All those girls know how to win. They just have to translate it to the basketball court. Winslow was raw, but there is some definitely talent there. I enjoyed my talk with Coach Gyurics after tha game, as she's one of the area's true straight-shooters, and look forward to their return to the upper echelon of the area.

She did bring up one very good point in saying that the Olympic stands to look a lot different a year from now. Graduations are going to blunt the conference's peaks and raise the valleys. The Cherry Hill Easts and Timber Creeks will miss their stars, while teams like Eastern bring everybody back. Off the top of my head, I'd say the Vikings, Cherokee, Washington Township, CC, Wilson, BE and Paul VI will almost certainly appear in next year's Preseason T20, with East, Pennsauken, and Shawnee perhaps showing up too.

I'll be at Haddon Township to see the Hawks play Heights tomorrow night. The Garnets are clinging to that half-game lead in the Colonial. No matter what they do, as long as Collingswood can beat Sterling on Saturday, that Heights-at-Colls game next Thursday will be for some or all of the league championship. If Haddonfield wins out in Colonial play, we could have a three-way tie at the top.

SJ girls bracketology

The state tournament sectional brackets have now been out for more than four days, and it's time to post some thoughts. Of course, there's no arguing with the seedings since they're based on pre-set criteria. It is interesting to wonder about how the different tournaments might play out, and the terrific games they might produce.

So:

SJ G4: The top seed and defending champion is Absegami, and the Braves are certainly also the team to beat. The best first-round game is probably Mainland-Washington Township, with the winner going to Cherry Hill East. The Mustangs can be a terrific team, and they love to run. Township uses pressure when they get behind, so if Mainland can get a lead, the game could turn into a track meet. Pennsauken is a real wildcard, up against Cherokee in another terrific first-round game. If Cherokee gets through, the Mostafa-Sweeney matchup could be fun to watch. I'm seeing Gami-AC III in the final, but not before a classic AC-CH East semi. Tasha Cannon could make her POY case there.

SJ G3: The top seed is Cumberland, the defending champion and team to beat is fourth-seeded Wilson. The first round features a rematch of last year's final, with Timber Creek visiting Wilson. It's kind of a tough break for the Chargers, because I think they could be the second-best team in the sectional if given the chance to prove it. Moorestown-Deptford and Kingsway-Hammonton are both intriguing first-round games. Cumberland is a wild card, kind of untested. Should Wilson survive TC's visit, it will be interesting to see all the orange on the court down in Colt country for the semis. Ocean City is a strong contender to get to the final, and young. We could see an OC-Wilson sectional final the next two years in a row.

SJ G2: Heights is the top seed and probably the team to beat, and Sterling is the defending champ. The best first-round game is Sterling-Pleasantville, with the Greyhounds being an unknown quantity to most people. That winner gets Glassboro, another relatively mysterious team. At full strength, the Bulldogs are probably the section's toughest squad, but how strong will they be? who knows. Glassboro was dealt a hard road to the final, through Sterling-Pvile and probably Haddonfield. Collingswood drew a more favorable path, facing Buena, West Tech and then probably Heights, a team they have already beaten once on the road, and which they will end up facing twice in like a week and a half. The first time is in Collingswood, and it could carry the Colonial in its balance. The winner of that semi will go into the final as the favorite, but not by much. Any one of eight teams, including Haddon Township, Cinnaminson and Sterling, could get hot and win this thing.

SJ G1: Pitman gets the top seed, Salem is the defending champ and possibly the team to beat. Literally all seven teams in this section have designs on at least the final, and I'd say six of them have a legitimate shot at the title, including seventh-seeded Lindenwold. Gloucester has been playing the best lately, or maybe it's Wildwood. I don't know. The best first-round game is Palmyra at Gloucester, with Lailah Pratt going up against Chelsea Conner. Last year, the team with the best big girl (Salem and Shanel Turner) took the crown, and this year it's Gloucester and Conner. A lot of the potential matchups in SJ G1 have precedence in the Trico Classic season, and third meetings are usually the craziest. So this bracket should be fun.

SJ N-P A: Camden Catholic is the top seed and the team to beat. The defending champion, St. John Vianney, is no longer defending, having bitten off more schedule than it could chew and missing the playoffs. I don't know when was the last time a TOC finalist missed the playoffs the very next year, and it's certainly never happened to a program of SJV's stature. That stunner left the door ajar for some rare good CC luck. Both Holy Spirit AND the scariest team in the section, Red Bank Catholic, are on the other side of the bracket from the Irish, who need beat only Holy Cross and most likely Monsignor Donovan, both at home. The best first-round game is Paul VI-Holy Spirit, and the winner will play RBC in the best semifinal matchup. Assuming Spirit gets through, that RBC game at Spirit would be an instant classic. In any case, the final at Lakewood is a can't-miss game.

SJ N-P B: Trenton Catholic is the top seed and the team to beat. Sacred Heart is the defending state champion and No. 5 seed. The best first-round game is probably Gloucester Catholic-Bishop Eustace. This is no longer a sister-on-sister coaching matchup, but there are still ties between the programs and plenty of emotion to go around. The winner has a tough assignment at St. Rose.Sacred Heart has to go on the road in the quarters to Mater Dei, and if the Lions get throgh that, the real test is at TCA. If Sacred Heart gets to the final, they can definitely win, but the road is incredibly difficult. I have no idea about Cardinal McCarrick other than a kickass record, so that makes the winner of the Wildwood Catholic-St. Joe matchup a wild card. Jay Reed's Wildcats have come on very strong lately, as evidenced by their close loss to Timber Creek, and Wildwood Catholic has a lot of ability. Obviously, Trenton Catholic is the class of this bracket, but anything can happen.

That's all I've got for now. As far as coverage for this week goes, I'm trying to get around to some teams I haven't seen before it's too late, so I'll be covering Eastern at Winslow Tuesday night. Eastern has been hot lately -- ask EHT and Washington Township -- and Winslow has been vary tough to beat at home -- ask Shawnee -- so this should be a pretty good game. See you there.

Response to commenters

My response got too long for the comment box, so I just pasted it here:

The rankings are based on wins AND losses, plus consistency. For example, if Pennsauken goes and beats Wilson, Pennsauken is going to jump up and Wilson is going to fall a little bit. But if, say, Overbrook beats Cumberland, I can't ignore Overbook's losses and just stick them in at No. 12. The rankings are a living thing, very subjective but as systematic as possible. In the end, the only ranking that matters to me is No. 1 and the only list that matters is the last one. I pray for clarity on that issue, and everything else is just fun. Everybody thinks this stuff is easy, and it certainly is simpler if you only care about one team.

And two polls kind of defeats the purpose of ranking teams to begin with, taking the fun out of it. It's now done in football for a bunch of reasons, including the fact that teams play only 10 or 11 games, and can't possibly schedule enough non-conference games to let us make a fair comparison. Another big reason is that you need at least 20 kids just to field a football team, whereas seven does the job in basketball. Small schools have competed just fine in the past. Sterling finished at No. 1 and the very next year, Wildwood -- the smallest public school in SJ -- finished No. 2. Now, what happens if we went to two sets of rankings and, say, Haddonfield lost to Shabazz in the TOC final. We wouldn't get to recognize them as the best team in SJ, but only the best small-school team.

The Colonial is in a downturn this year. The best teams right now -- in my view, Heights and Collingswood -- have one senior starter between them, and a lot of the squads that are normally there have fallen out. If you recall, five Colonial teams -- Haddonfield, Heights, Sterling, Collingswood and Haddon Township -- were in the Preseason Top 20, and every one of them fell out at different times for very real reasons. Pitman was in and fell out. Glassboro did the same. I can't keep somebody ranked just for the sake of school-size diversity. If I did, the rankings we publish in the paper would be a sham and I'd have to come on here and post "the real T20" every week.

If the coaches of the smaller schools believe they're getting disrespected in the rankings, they have not told me. I hear it mostly from the parents, and god bless them, but they're whacked. In the pyramid of respected opinions, kids and coaches are at the top and parents are at the bottom because their passions so often get the best of them.

AC 51, Trenton Central 41

Tasha Cannon is quite awesome. The rest of that team is beginning to rise to the occasion.

Talking to Greg Goodwin and Karl Geisinger during the game, nobody really wants to see AC in the Group 4 playoffs and it's all about Tasha. Goodwin said Gami has played her 10 times and won every one, but and he's terrified of 11 and I don't blame him at all. Trenton, a pretty athletic team, had no answer for Cannon. The Player of the Year discussion is one for another day, but she's in it without a doubt. Of course, a lot depends on what AC does in the upcoming playoffs.

This was a good, good win for AC, maybe its best of the year. And the supporting cast hit some big shots in the second half, none bigger than Monique Garcia's three at the end of the third quarter. Usually Montague is a clear second-best player for AC, but this time the entire team stepped forward.

To be honest, I went down there to see Absegam play Camden Catholic, and thank god I went as early as I did. When I arrived, Karl had just been informed that the irish weren't coming. Apparently, it was Monsignor Martin's call, and I can't say it was the wrong one. Certainly I was disappointed, as was Gami, Catholic, the event organizers, the fans that were in the gym yesterday and those who found out in time not to come. But Monsignor Martin has a different set of objectives and it's hard to say a decision in the interest of the kids' safety. I had my doubts, but driving home at around 8 p.m. -- about an hour before CC's prospective return trip -- it started getting slick out there. I do feel bad for Karl and his people at Mainland, who lost thousands of dollars on Saturday, and probably more today. They work very hard and put on a first-class event every year. I hope they've exhausted their bad luck for another 10 years.

I went to the second part of that funeral way early in the morning yesterday, and actually less than 30 minutes of sleep. So I was falling asleep at the wheel on the way down, until stopping off for a caffeine IV at the old Farley Rest Stop on the expressway, and it left me a little jittery and talkative, not quite myself. Then I was sure that Ac was actually playing Trenton Catholic, not Trenton Central, and when somebody asked be about Central I told them what I knew about Catholic, going on and on about what a talent Jasmyra Saunders was. When I saw it said Central in the program, and Saunders wasn't listed, I kept insisting that the program was wrong. I was in a strange mood. Of course, I was wrong, as was the schedule we had in the paper, which led me astray in the first place. I have no idea how it happened.

Anyway, I caught the very end of the Lenape-Sacred Heart game, and wondered why Lynn Brennan wasn't there. I asked a bunch of people during the game, and all of them were wondering but nobody knew. I intended to get to the bottom of it but I got distracted and missed the Indians and their folks before they left.

Another tidbit that a bounch of people were buzzing about was Holy Spirit's loss of Teena Marsh, who has apparently suffered, or aggravated, a knee injury. She won't be back this season, apparently, which is a tough break for the Spartans. It also puts the spotlight back on freshmen Jessie Frazier, one of the very best I've seen in the Class of '09. I'm assuming she'll be back in the starting lineup now.

Well, that's pretty much all I remember right now. I'm going to try to post tomorrow on some of the topics I mentioned at the end a couple of days ago: the brackets, the bill in the state legislature, etc. We'll see if I get around to it.

New C-P T20

1. Catholic
2. Gami
3. Wilson
4. Spirit
5. Boro
6. AC
7. RV
8. OC
9. Eustace
10. PVI
11. CH East
12. Cumberland
13. Wash. Twp.
14. Cherokee
15. Sacred Heart
16. Collingswood
17. Pleasantville
18. Timber Creek
19. Heights
20. Moorestown

Almost: Egg Harbor Township, Haddonfield, Mainland, Sterling, Wildwood, Gloucester, Williamstown, Highland, Cinnaminson, Wildwood Catholic, Pitman, Williamstown

Eastern upset a couple of teams this week, including Washington Township, but two wins over Cherokee kept the Maids from fallling too far. It takes more than a mild upset to drop a team below an opponent they bested twice. If they had split or even if they Township had won their only meeting, Washington Township would be ranked between 15 and 20. EHT had no such safety net, and the Eagles were a bit closer to the edge, so they fell out this week, as did Mainland with a loss to Wildwood on its home floor and Haddonfield with the 20-point loss to the Colls. All three of those teams are a big win away from getting back in, and certainly if Haddonfield starts playing like they did at the beginning of the season it won't take long.

Cherry Hill East moves behind Paul VI, as I indicated they would earlier in the week. After seeing Abiona and Vespe play, I think it's unfortunate that they were not available on Tuesday, becuase it would have been a great game.

Timber Creek, Heights and Moorestown make it in this week. The Chargers have been solid since a stunning loss to Clearview, and an overtime defeat to Collingswood at the Cougar Classic has been looking better and better. This was a top 10 team to start the season, and TC has now won eight straight.

Heights... well, after all the whining the Heights folks were doing, I almost decided to leave them out one more week just to screw with them, but thought better of it. The rankings maybe aren't the place for jokes. A couple years ago in boys' soccer, I was getting so many out-of-touch critics that I decided to put my alma mater, St. Joseph's Prep, in the "Top 21" rankings at No. 2 just for the purposes of the blog. People went nuts. I could do the same thing here for the same reason, but the joke wouldn't be as funny because SJP is an all-boys school. Or maybe it would be even funnier... Don't worry, I won't.

I've been looking to get Moorestown into the T20 for a while, but the Quakers' lopsided loss to Heights really hindered them. This is a team with a little tarnish on the older fenders, a couple losses, but they were the last team to beat Eastern before the Vikings started ripping off upsets.

I'll be posting about the game I ended up covering yesterday, AC-Trenton Central, in a little while, hopefully tonight. Sorry for the delay. I really have no excuse or anything, I just felt like doing other stuff.

Gami-Catholic breakdown

Know this: I love snow.

It's fun to play it, it makes everything pretty, it brings people together, cancels school at a time of the year when kids most desperately need an unexpected day off, and it reminds us all how nice it is to live at a time when we can just turn the heat up and watch the show.

But snow is breaking my mind today, and the feeling is all too familiar.

This season, Gami-Catholic at the Shootout is the game everyone has pointed to all year, but a few years ago it was Willingboro-Christ the King at Ventnor. CTK had been ranked No. 1, then lost to Marlboro without its point guard, then got it's point back from injury, returning to the level of performance that took it to No. 1 in the first place, settling into the national top 5. Boro had beaten every oppenent -- many of them high-quality teams -- by like 30, and was ranked around No. 15. Nobody knew just how good the Chimeras were, even Crystal, Lateisha and the rest of the team. The CTK game was supposed to tell us, but snow wiped that one off the calendar, and it was never made up. Boro never got the test that it needed going into the playoffs, then got famously dressed down in a ferocious Shabazz first half. A tested team would have known how to respond there, but the Chimeras flailed in the open ocean, and never really made it a game as Shabazz-leaning Dunn Center went nuts.

I'm afraid the Irish are playing the role of Willingboro, and snow is about to rob them of their much-needed pre-playoff punch in the face. Maybe Bloomfield Tech was enough, but things have been going way too well for comfort ever since. CC is probably less prone to overconfidence than that Boro group because the program has never won the big game -- not even a SJ championship -- but it's still worrisome.

If they play, I will be there, even if it's at 5. But I'm fretting that they won't play. And if these reports of the flu sweeping through the Catholic ranks are true, then I don't know what to think. If Gami wins, the Braves will go back to No. 1, there's no question. It would just be a shame to award the C-P Cup based on such a game. If they both win state titles, they could easily meet again, probably as the 2-3 semi in the TOC, but that's looking way too far down the line.

OK. Let's assume they play the game and everyone is healthy. Big assumption, of course, but position by position:
PG edge goes to CC. Gami hasn't ever had a true point in recent memory. Basimah Thompson had the physical capability to be a pure point, but the four 30-footers she took every game DQed her. Plus Crew knows Gami, she almost beat them with Spirit last year.
SG edge goes very slightly to CC. Matera is a more reliable shooter than anyone Gami has. Taylor and James are terrific players, but I'd take a true point and a true shooter over two combo guards in most situations.
SF edge goes to Gami, but I think this might be the most important matchup on the floor. Can Gallagher, with her all-around athletic ability, keep Booker from playing the decisive scoring role that she did against Wilson and AC? The battle of the boards will be won at this position too.
PF edge goes to Gami, but this advantage could easily be negated if Catholic turns the pace up. Rosario is bigger and stronger than Lane, but a running game diminishes her game. Lane is much more effective than Krissy on the run.
C edge goes to CC, but not by that much. I'm really, really interested to see the Ra-Mostafa matchup. Beyond the obvious changing-of-the-guard theme, both players are used to defenses collapsing on them to negate an ever-present size advantage. I expect Booker and Rosario to look to help on Junaid a little bit, but I'm sort of hoping the coaches let the two biggest bigs sort it out by themselves a few times.
One nostalgic aside: When I was covering Temple, the Owls had an enigmatic PF named Lamont Barnes who wasn't worth a bag of sand during the Atlantic 10 regular season because he would always bring the ball down to waist-level where the outsized guard or small forward assigned to help could strip him or otherwise harass. But when Temple got to the NCAA Tournament and played teams like Cincinnati, which had a PF (named Kenyon Martin) who was supposed to be able to be able to handle himself straight up, Barnes lit it up like a lottery pick.
Now, I'm not saying Junaid or Mostafa has the same kind of obvious flaw that Lamont Barnes inexplicably had, but I've never seen either one play straight up against another center or her caliber.
Anyway, moving on.
The Bench edge goes slightly to CC. The Irish have able backups for everyone but Ra, and after the Gami-Wilson game we know that the Braves are susceptible to foul trouble. Gami's reserves are able, especially Ty Abdilla, who I've seen play well in a couple of tough spots, but Plakis, Sharpe, Mahon, Dombrowski, etc., are probably the best bench in SJ. That all changes if -- as the rumors suggest -- three CC starters are out with the flu. Any position where a CC reserve is starting is automatically an edge for Gami, despite the quality of the Irish bench.
Intanglibles probably favor Gami. The Braves have been in more big games so far, they're not protecting an undefeated season, plus they've got a 15 or 20-minute bus ride and CC has a 90-minute one.
Coaching is a wash. I have the utmost confidence in both of those staffs. Goodwin and Palladino have well over 600 career wins between them, and they have both showed a remarkable ability to adjust strategy midgame this year. I've always thought that one sign of a weak coach is an inability to ditch a solid game plan that should work, but doesn't. Both coaches know their teams extremely well, and I'd be shocked if they hadn't done all possible homework.
Like many games, I think this one will be decided by tempo. Which team can impose its will. CC will try to push it, and Gami will try to keep it half-court. The thing that makes the game so intriguing is the fact that Gami can run a little bit and Catholic has perhaps the best half-court player in SJ in Junaid.

Hopefully, all this mindless analysis won't be for nothing. All we need is for the game to come off as planned, with everyone healthy and at full strength, and I'll happily drive my still-muddy car through the snowstorm for four hours or more.

Funny, it didn't seem like too much to ask a few days ago, but now...

CH East 44, Pennsauken 35

Tons of stuff to get to, so I'll dispense with the game quickly. This was actually my first time seeing Ivy Abiona play a whole game, and I have to say I'm with GW: she's got a ton of potential. My feelings were lukewarm until the fourth quarter, when she just decided to take over for a stretch. Then she broke the Pennsauken press with the dribble andthat was it. I'm an Abiona fan. Just seeing a strong, 6-2 girl make those moves with her head up, looking to make a play, was worth the price of admission.

As I suspected, there was apparently some internal CH East turmoil behind the absence of Abiona and Britney Vespe from the Paul VI thrashing. I'm so glad I didn't cover that game, because I kind of wanted to. I'm still not certain what the exact problems were, but Coach Keyack assured me that all is solved now, and the Cougars are moving forward. It took them a while to translate that assurance to the court, but there were certainly flashes of the team they could be. Coach Keyack and I talked about the possibility of some kind of post-cutoff letdown, with the division sewn up and the SJ Group 4 No. 2 seed secure. It's understandable, but certainly not ideal.

A couple of years ago, the Rancocas Valley boys soccer team suddenly caught fire in the second half of the season and went all the way to a state title, and both the players and the coaches attributed it to an unmatched level of discipline that they adopted midstream. The called it "military disciple" and they took it all the way, with old school pre-game calisthenics, even lining their bags up in numerical order. But they all said it wouldn't have worked without the first half of the season's laxity and frivolity. The lesson here being that a team can't expect to play on the edge every day, and there's an art to getting by on 85 percent. The Cougars practiced that art today, but on the heels of the shellacking at the hands of Paul VI, I'm not sure it was exactly what the East coaches were looking for.

Pennsauken was very game today, even though Elise Graham was not only slightly overmatched by Abiona but hurting bad from a tailbone injury. Coach Ciociola said this was her first game back after missing 10, and I didn't realize how much discomfort she was in until I saw her after the game, and she could barely get around. The girls that really impressed, though, was Ashley Thompson. I could see that she's a little raw, but she was the kind of raw that made me think she was a lot rawer not too long ago. Though she clearly showed that she could shoot, steal, handle, rebound, pass and defend, it was her decision-making that got me. For a raw player, she made very, very few mistakes today. I'm not saying she played a perfect game, but the Indians showed a lot of patience in the halfcourt-set, and the times that she pushed the pace were the right times. It didn't make for the insane, breakneck intensity that accompanies many HS girls' games, and the addition of East's general malaise made it feel like a JV game for the first half, but I was impressed nonetheless.

OK, so much for dispensing with the game quickly. It's like 3 a.m., and I have just enough energy left to apologize again for not being able to cover the Willingboro-RV game Friday night. I'm going to do my best to resist the urge to call the office for the score around 8:30 or so. I'm going to try to post sometime tomorrow afternoon, touching on the following topics: the release of the brackets (always an exciting time), the remaining undecided division races, snow, and the bill that passed the NJ assembly regarding NJSIAA ticket pricing. I'll also try to break down the upcoming Gami-Catholic matchup, including what I see as the keys to the game and the players that might make the difference.

But for now, I'm out.

Wednesday is still for wrestling

I spent a bone-numbing day in the office today, taking wrestling score after wrestling score. Actually, other folks carried most of the load until about 9 p.m., when I thought they were going to drown. Then I started picking up the phone.

Wrestling is a weird sport. My dad wrestled in his days at Woodrow Wilson, so I grew up with a respect for the sport, but as an adult I look at it kind of like it's a dinosaur, especially because it makes no room for girls. I'm not certain most girls would be interested in wrestling -- though there are several girls competing in the area -- but there is definite value in that sort of visceral, one-on-one kind of competition.

My idea is to replace wrestling with martial arts, whether it be taekwondo or judo or kendo or whetaver. It would preserve the lessons and values that wrestling espouses, while leaving the door open wider for girls. Plus, the spiritual, life-management lessons inherent in martial arts would be a benefit beyond the mat, and these athletes enjoyment of the sport could continue after high school, in any area of the world.

Obviously, it wouldn't be all that great for girls' basketball because hoops pretty much has a monopoly on the wintertime freelance team-sport athletes in a given school. In the fall, girls pick soccer or field hockey, and the spring offers softball and lacrosse or track. In the winter, swimming gets its share, but most swimmers are swimmers only all year round and aren't in circulation the rest of the school year. The addition of martial arts wouldn't touch the type of players that start for top 20 teams, but the sport's depth would be affected.

Of course, any discussion of such a thing is pie in the sky. Nothing like it is in the works or probably even in the minds of the NJSIAA. Even if a buzz were to start today, nothing would happen for years and years. So wrestling, a slowly dying sport, is here to ruin my Wednesday nights for the forseeable future.

Tomorrow, I'll be at Cherry Hill East, and the first thing I'll do it try to figure out why Abiona and Vespe didn't play against Paul VI. I'm not sure how much difference they would have made, and as far as the rankings go it doesn't matter: the team that plays is the team that plays. I was scheduled to cover Willingboro-RV II on Friday, but a death in my wife's family will prevent that pleasure. The relative who passed away was just 44 years old, a good guy and a good Democrat; he was a ward leader in the Fishtown section of Philly, a throwback political foot soldier. All that is undoubtedly contributing to my strange mood the last couple of days. Hopefully, the funeral will do what it's supposed to do and provide a place to put those feelings.

Anyway, I'll see you at the gym.

CWood 41, Haddons 24

Thanks very much to Collingswood announcer and all-around astute observer Geoff Filinuk, who gave me a coupon for a free car wash when I walked in the gym this evening. Yes, my car is still covered in Mt. Holly mud. I've been waiting for a rainstorm to wash it away but now I don't have to. Now if I could only get around to cleaning out all the junk on this inside of my car...

Anyway, this was my first chance to see Collingswood since catching the last few minutes of a lopsided loss to Hammonton back at the Boardwalk Classic during the holidays. And I guess I didn't realize until the opening introductions how young these girls are. The Panthers started two juniors and three sophomores today, and they did pretty much everything but shoot well.

The defense was the most impressive thing, though. Even without Katie Feeley (who has some serious quick feet when healthy) the Colls' zone held Haddonfield to a season-low point total, nine fewer than the previous low, 33 in the now-infamous game at Heights. I added up the Dawgs' scores from the rest of the year and it came out to an average of 55.8 points a game coming into tonight. So when Collingswood had a nine-point lead going into the fourth quarter, the Panthers' D made it seem more like a 20-point edge.

Lauren Gregg had a stellar game today, and I can't wait to see more out of her. Brazyl Richardson seemed very raw to me at first, but late in the game she showed dome fadeaway touch that impressed. Still, I'd prefer to see a post player finish at the glass than fall backwards, but that takes real confidence. I liked the Crites sisters' games a lot, especially for 10th graders. Barring something catastrophic, Heights will certainly enter next season as the Colonial favorite with five three-year-starting seniors, but I can't wait to see this team develop too. That could turn into a monster rivalry over the next season and a third, with both Colonial and South Jersey Group 2 titles hanging in the balance. If I'm not mistaken, the teams could meet in the sectional semis at Heights this time around, but I'm not going to get into any of that until the brackets are actually released.

I felt bad for Haddonfield because they played hard, Annie Maloney and Laura Gurelian in particular. The Dawgs got some offense going in little spurts, but seeing as they never scored more than eight in any one quarter, those spurts didn't last very long. They managed just eight field goals for the game. It's very, very tough to win that way. On defense, I thought they did a decent job, given the fact that Collingswood knew very well it had an advantage down low. I'd have to go back and check, but I don't think many of the Colls' points were in the paint, especially if you don't count second-chance points. Rebounding, of course, was a real factor in the Colls' favor to about a 3-to-2 ratio. It was wider in the first half, and then Haddonfield started throwing its bodies around some more. Gurelian, again, was a big help. She's not the biggest player on the court by far, and there's no earthly reason she should come up with the number of boards she does, but both times I've seen Haddonfield play a whole game, there she is, hauling in the rebounds. Well done.

I was sitting right by the scorer's table behind the Collingswood bench, and in hindsight I think it was a good thing because the Haddonfield faithful were pretty hard on the officials. One of them -- Annette, I think her name is -- has been following me around lately. She was at Cinnaminson-Holy Cross Friday, then Haddon Township-Sterling the next afternoon, and now Haddonfield-Collingswood. There are officials that I don't see twice in a whole season, and I've run into this one three days straight. She's been solid every time I've watched her, so she's joined the group of officials that I'm happy to see walk in the gym. The other official, Carol, has always been one of those too, but the Haddonfield folks were all over her.

I was actually starting to get a little embarrassed for them, especially because they were calling her out by name. It was kind of an ugly thing. And I was embarrassed on behalf of the players on the floor, too, because their behavior has always seemed cool, the picture of the high road. Everyone else associated with the team has been otherwise. I'm not sure where this persecution complex came from, but when you hail from a school district like Haddonfield, it is not becoming in the least. At the aforementioned Dawgs-Garnets game, I didn't think the refs had a very good night and said so in my post, thus opening up a can o' worms. That was not the case tonight. I thought the officials had a fine night this time. I can remember one play, where Vicki Roddy took a charge and as soon as the call was made my inner voice said, "Good call." And the Haddons bench and bleachers went completely berserk.

Oh well. I've got an evening in the office planned for tomorrow, and then I'll be at Pennsauken-Cherry Hill East watching two teams that got their asses handed to them tonight. I've really been enjoying all the folks from Heights clamoring about the rankings -- I even got a four-page latter about it via "certified mail" today, whatever that means -- but I wonder why so many of them are fixated on Paul VI as being undeserving. Having seen both teams play, I'm not certain the Eagles wouldn't win that game by 20. One person did a position-by-position comparison and only gave PVI one edge in the starting five, which made me actually laugh out loud.

Look. I'm not pushing any team. I want to see everybody's best game every time I go out there because it's more fun that way. And I don't know everything or see everything, and I make plenty of mistakes. But the keyhole logic that people can convince themselves with is constantly hilarious to me. In any case, I just wanted to tell everybody to keep up the good work because it's been a lot of fun.

The week ahead

The cutoff day has passed, and the annual endgame begins. Teams that scraped their way into the playoffs are breathing a sigh of relief and waiting with excitement for the brackets to come out (probably Thursday). Squads that missed the playoffs will just play out the string, while coaches look hard for opportunties to reward seniors and prepare the kids who will be back next year. The teams with championship hopes are looking for chemistry and seasoning, and there are even a few division titles out there to be won.

I'll be at Haddonfield-Collingswood Tuesday night, and as I mentioned in some other recent post, this game will have serious Colonial implications. If you're Haddon Heights, I'm guessing you're rooting for Haddonfield because this is one of the leagues that does not break ties. Collingswood is the only team that currently owns the hypothetical, mythical, what-if tiebreaker of head-to-head. I personally wish every league broke ties, but currently only the Olympic Conference and the Cape-Atlantic League do so.

In any case, the Colonial potentially has about two or three more twists before we'll be able to figure things out for sure, and any one of those teams would certainly cede the league if it meant victory in South Jersey Group 2.

On Thursday I'll be at Pennsauken-Cherry Hill East. The Olympic American is already decided in East's favor, but I feel like I've been neglecting the Cougars, who just keep on winning like it's going out of style. One of the least talked-about heroics of the season have probably been those of the CHE backcourt. Abiona gets a lot of credit, and Ivy certainly is gifted and able, but Tejada lights it up in practically every big game and gets considerably less credit. I'm hoping those East guards have a good day so we can maybe fix that. And if Pennsauken comes up with the upset, then we can talk about Elise Graham and the girls as a potential spoilerin SJ Group 4.

On Friday, I'll be at RV for the Willingboro game. I saw the first installment of this season series back on opening night when Crews was awesome and Cole was not herself. Now it's Crews that may be hurt -- I have not heard about the status of her ankle -- and the Red Devils have been rolling ever since a lackluster loss to Trenton Catholic back at the Cougar Classic. I don't know what the Trenton Central folks will be doing that night, but I've seen them at a bunch of games so far this year and I wouldn't be shocked to see them in the gym for this one, since RV is a certain contender in Central Jersey Group 4.

The next day I'll be down at Mainland, of course, covering The Big Game. I love that event, so I'll probably go and watch most of the games just for the hell of it, and fill up the notebook for the next week. So if anybody's inclined to come over and yell at me about the rankings or anything else, feel free to do it. That is until 7 p.m., because Gami-Catholic is going to be a tough fit, deadline-wise. In fact, I think I'm going to have to scrounge up a phone line so I can send my story right from the gym. With an early deadline Saturday night, there may not even have time to get to a Starbucks.

New C-P T20

With the exception of the last two places, this edition of the rankings was by far the simplest version of the exercise yet, at least in this sport (back when I was covering tennis and swimming, there would be entire weeks without a single change). So:

1. CCath
2. Gami
3. Wilson
4. Spirit
5. Boro
6. ACity
7. RV
8. CH East
9. OCity
10. Eustace
11. PVI
12. Wash. Twp.
13. Cumberland
14. Cherokee
15. SHeart
16. Mainland
17. EHT
18. Haddonfield
19. Collingswood
20. Pleasantville

Almost: Heights, Williamstown, Glassboro, Cinnaminson, Moorestown, Timber Creek, Pleasantville, Wildwood, WW Cath., Highland, Salem, Gloucester, Sterling.

I think 10 is the most "almost" teams I've ever had, but I can honestly say I tried on every single one of those squads in the last two places, and the two that ended up there felt the best.

What the heck happened to Williamstown? is my question after seeing the scores of the last two days roll in. They get upset by a Pitman team that started hot but has cooled off considerably in the last few weeks, and then they lose decisively to EHT. Both of those teams are solid, with solid records, so the Braves didn't fall far below the surface, but combined with Glassboro's getting thumped at Wildwood, it was not a banner week for the Trico, and as a result, Cumberland is carrying that league's flag alone right now.

Now I know that some folks are wondering why Heights isn't there, and somebody even called the office to talk about it, so I'll explain it one more time. Heights and Haddonfield split. Yes, the Heights win was more recent, but just like the Dawgs, the Garnets took their home game, which says to me that the two teams are even. The thing that separates them is the fact that Haddonfield has stepped outside the conference and beaten good teams, namely No. 8 Cherry Hill East and No. 15 Sacred Heart. Heights' only T20 win was Haddonfield, and the Garnets also lost to that same Dawg team as welll as No. 16 Mainland and new No. 19 Collingswood. Importantly, the Colls loss was AT HOME, and has yet to be avenged. I can understand the argument that Heights people are making because it's very easy to get fixated on Haddonfield and the most recent game. But take a step back and look at all the available information and the decision isn't even all that difficult.

Over the past few weeks, I've gome to appreciated how truly blessed the girls' game in this area had been to have courageous elite teams, all of which play each other during the regular season like the members of some mythical division. Wilson, for instance, is now 3-3 against teams in the SJ Top 6 and 7-3 against the Top 11, not to mention the out-of-area studs they play. The biggest treat left, of course, in next Saturday's CC-Gami showdown at Mainland. I've often thought it would be really cool to have a SJ Coaches' Tournament for hoops, like they do in soccer, but the top girls teams take care of things on their own pretty well.

Sterling thrills, WIlson rolls

My car is now covered in mud, but I consider myself lucky. In a blind hurry, I took one of the parking places along the grass at Rancocas Valley today, and while I was inside watching Wilson take care of Willingboro, the rain softened the ground enough that I almost couldn't back out. After five minutes of back and forth, spinning those wheels, I finally escaped. I apologize heartily to whomever has to take care of that grass, but I'm pretty sure I wasn't going to end up the only one tearing the turf today.

That wasn't even the first or last thing that went other than planned today.

My day started going south when I showed up at Sterling a 1 this afternoon and no one was there. I remember the game being at 1, the schedule I had with me said 1, but when I went to the Wawa on Warwick and bought a paper it was listed as 3. So I sat there in my car doing busyword for 90 minutes and went to the game. The time change certainly tightened things up, as the Wilson-Willingboro game was scheduled for 5:00 at least 30 minutes away, but I was optimistic. As long as Haddon Township and Sterling didn't go to overtime, I stood a good shot at being OK.

Never had a chance.

Haddon Township teased me with an eight-point lead in the third quarter, playing great defense, grabbing some boards. Sterling teased me by staying cold for pretty much the whole game, and I thought I was in the clear. But then Cassi Bryant decided to make my life more complicated. She pretty much ressurrected the Knights all by herself, and they started playing better as a team. They hit some foul shots, grabbed a lot of rebounds and a ton of loose balls, and changed the game. Kate Brennan still seems out of sync, but Sterling won today despite things not going their way.

As for Township, I always enjoy watching the Hawks play and today was no exception. Every girl on that team does one or two things extremely well. Nora Murphy can really handle the ball, Chrissy Barnett knows how to move without it, Sam Garwood is a terrific passer, Lori Merkh can really defend and Colleen Greway blocked seven shots. They just couldn't make a play when they needed to, and some brain cramps at the ends of periods, including overtime, really hurt them. The Hawks had the ball down three with 15 seconds left, but they couldn't find a shot right away. With about five seconds left, they drove for the easy two and Sterling was happy to let them have it. Once the quick two wasn't there, they needed to get a three off. But as Coach Mulligan said, "These are high school kids, and they make mistakes."

So the game ended, I jumped in my car at 4:31 and spent the next phase of my life breaking as many local ordinances as possible. I parked in the aforementioned quagmire and ran inside to find absolutely no available seats in the RV gym. I so wish this game had been scheduled for the other gym, the one with two sides of bleachers, but alas, luck was not on my side today. I only missed a little bit of the game, getting there in plenty of time to see De'ree Fooks' 1,000th career point and then watcher absolutely go off for the rest of the half. She was quueiter in the second, but I still think she's only of the best around. I've actually begun to think of her as a first-team All-SJ player most of the time.

I wasn't at all surprised by the outcome of this game. Boro played a lot harder than they did on Tuesday, but Wilson is also a better team than Spirit, even with the transfers eligible for the Spartans. There isn't much else to say about this game, other than to hope for the best of health for Tiffany Crews and Shinaa Cross. Both girls left the game with injuries -- Crews with a sprained ankle and Cross with a strained calf -- and Crews was on crutched afterwards. Both teams have huge games upcoming and great promise for the playoffs, but they really need those players in the lineup, and it's always a shame to see a player's season end with an injury.

Anyway, I'm going to try to sort out the playoff picture and the rankings. I'll post the T20 sometime tomorrow.

Cinnaminson 48, Holy Cross 26

I don't have too much to say about this game. I was happy to see Cinnaminson play well, since the only other time I saw the Pirates they obviously didn't have the A game working. The defense they threw at Holy Cross tonight was impressive, especially since the Lancers do a pretty decent job setting high screens for their shooters. Once Cinnaminson kind of gave up on fighting through them and decided to concentrate on switching, HC had a lot more trouble.

I was glad that HC coach Fred Phillips came out to talk after the game. Those of you who have been reading for a long time might remember the misunderstanding when he didn't appear after the Eustace game, and he later told me that it would be fine to go back there looking for him. But I'm grateful it didn't come to that. As an outsider, something about the sanctity of a locker room makes me not want to break it even if the players have all gone.

The Burlco Patriot, like just about every other SJ division, is very close to resolution. All the Pirates have to do is beat Delran at home on Tuesday, and that's a wrap. Next week will also see Willingboro-RV and West Tech-Trenton Catholic games that will decide division races once and for all. AC and Gami will play for the CAL American I title tomorrow, American II is done, National I is down to Spirit-Pleasantville sometime soon, and Sacred Heart is just a win or two away in National II. I haven't figured out what Williamstown has to do, exactly, to take care of the Trico Royal, but beating Cumberland for a second time is just about it. Glassboro is pretty close to clinching in the Classic. All three divisions are done in the Olympic, with East and Timber Creek repeating and CC getting over the hump in the National.

That just leaves the Colonial, which continues to be a mess. When I scheduled myself to cover Haddon Township-Sterling tomorrow, I figured that game would have some sort of title implications, but after both those teams lost on Tuesday, it looks more like a very good fourth-place game. Next Tuesday's Haddonfield game at Collingswood will decide a lot. If the Haddons win, then they'll have the leg up with tough games against Sterling and Haddon Township left. If Collingswood wins, then it's a three-team race hinging on a Panthers home game against the only two-loss team left, Heights. If that seems complicated, you haven't been paying attention because it's actually a vast oversimplification. Mathematically, I'm pretty sure Haddon Township and Sterling both continue to have a chance.

I'm really looking forward to tomorrow's HTWp-Sterling game, because that matchup -- especially at Sterling's gym -- always seems to deliver a thriller. I know it went to overtime with the Hawks prevailing the first time, so I'm hoping for more of the same. I haven't seen Township play yet, and I haven't seen Sterling since covering them twice in the first week, so that will make it even more fun. I expect the Knights to be much improved, so long as Kate Brennan is in the lineup and healthy. From looking at the scores, it seems like her absence allowed Cassi Bryant to find her game a little bit, and it's they're able to play well on the same court at the same moment, that team could be an extremely formidable opponent in SJ Group 2.

The subplot of every game tomorrow, of course, is the cutoff, and the playoff picture that appears in the Varsity section will be subject to a ton on jostling. Tonight, for instance, Pitman might have secured the top seed in SJ Group 1 with a stunning upset of Williamstown, while the Braves almost certainly fell a spot or more in SJ Group 4. Buena played its way in today, while Moorestown Friends missed a chance to do the same. In short, there are very few inconsequential games this weekend. Those who have the time should really get out to see a game or two, if at all possible, because the intensity around this day can almost approach playoff proportions.

I'm happy to say that I'll be covering a second game: Willingboro-Wilson tomorrow evening at Rancocas Valley. The Boro will be trying to avoid losing two straight and Wilson will be trying to avoid losing three of its last four. I have no idea what the potential seeding situation is for Boro in CJ Group 3, but for the Tigers, a win could help and a loss would almost definitely hurt. In any case, it will be an entertaining contest, and I'll see you there.