Lancaster Country Day Ultimately Solves Annville-Cleona Riddle As Strong Second Half Helps Usher Cougars To Section Triumph Over Dutchmen
Written by: Andy Herr on January 27, 2023
As is typically the case most every season, sometimes just a change in scenery can make a world of difference for a team. Or, more specifically, a change in the calendar if you will.
For Annville-Cleona’s boys’ hoops squad, you’d understand as to why they were probably just as excited to watch the ball drop as the people there in Times Square that night on December 31st in New York City. You see, throughout the month of December, the Dutchmen had lugged around a sub .500 overall record, including a stretch where A-C proceeded to drop their last five contests prior to the start of the new year.
Since then however, it’s been a welcomed bit of fresh air for the team that shares their namesake with the university just up the street.
In fact, coming into their Thursday night game at Lancaster Country Day this week, A-C had quickly morphed itself into becoming one of the feel-good storylines throughout the Lancaster-Lebanon League in January thus far, especially given their five-win total already exerted during the month up until their late-week affair in the den of the Cougars.
Speaking of those Cougars, it’s largely been more of the same displayed by the conference’s lone single-A program.
Here, yet again, Country Day has been seen fighting tooth and nail against the division’s cream of the crop if you will in Columbia and Lancaster Mennonite respectively, including the Cougs’ last outing prior to welcoming A-C into Parent’s Fieldhouse when they traveled to the home of the Crimson Tide and promptly made the hosts sweat bullets down the final stretch as Country Day cut the lead into a one-possession contest inside the final minute before eventually falling victim to a 63-56 final verdict that went in favor of the Tide. And for that reason –yet not strictly for that reason by itself — there’s ample reason as to why LCD figures to follow the same familiar script come the latter part of February this year which almost always tends to have the Cougars drastically under-seeded inside the District 3-1A field before an eventual galivant to what they hope is another trip to the Giant Center to compete for district supremacy.
So, in short, while most may have overlooked this particular matchup at first blush, the grudge match between A-C and Country Day figured to live up to quite a bit of billing considering how well both units had been playing of late. And quite frankly, while the eventual final score would show Country Day as the decisive victor in the form of a 17-point triumph, rest assured that the Dutchmen were anything but thoroughly outplayed.
In the early going on Thursday night, it was largely as if a volleyball game had suddenly broken out given that both teams seemed to do nothing but trade buckets back and forth with one another. Case in point, while A-C sophomore guard Elisha Shabach would fire in a trifecta to give the visitors a 9-6 lead at the 4:30 mark of the opening frame, a steady and persistent Country Day charge would soon rear its head in the form of a 4-0 response, a rally that would soon put the Cougs back on top at 10-9 following a Jordan Ashby bunny underneath two minutes afterwards.
From there, even with Country Day then building their cushion up to four following a trey by way of the other piece of the brothers Ashby, Toby Ashby, at 13-9 on the Cougars’ very next offensive possession, Annville-Cleona would be able to get back on level footing following a nifty runner in the lane courtesy of senior point guard Ricky Cruz which knotted things up at 14-14 inside of 30 seconds left to play in the first. That said, the brief stalemate would be precisely that, brief, considering how Country Day would be able to saunter into the second quarter with ownership of the 17-14 advantage.
Now, aside from the fact that obvious prevailing theme that had enveloped the opening half up until that point was the back-and-forth nature of it all, there was another plotline bubbling up to the surface —Elisha Shabach’s hot shooting from beyond the arc.
Sure enough, inside the opening few minutes of the game’s second quarter, the Dutchmen’s sophomore sniper was able to work himself into a groove of all grooves seeing as how he would proceed to fire in five triples inside the opening half, including a pair here which put A-C back in front at 21-17 with 5:20 left before the intermission, en route to a sizzling 16-point outing, good for a remarkable point-per-minute basis found in HS basketball, inside the opening half of play on Thursday.
But here again though, even with Annville-Cleona trying their best to try and land haymakers against the opposition, Country Day stood firm.
In fact, even in the aftermath following the latest bit of Shabach’s exploits, the Cougars were able to draw back even at 21-21 courtesy of a sweet Euro-step move en route to the hoop by way of their 5’11 senior stud, Jordan Ashby, with 3:35 still to go.
And even with Shabach pumping in another 3-ball not long after that, a 4-4 stretch at the charity stripe by Ashby down the final stretch of the second quarter helped to propel Country Day into the locker room with the slim 32-29 cushion over the guests from Lebanon County.
As far as the second half, however? Well, that’s eventually where Country Day would put their foot down.
It all started rather quickly in fact as far as the terms of it all being dictated to LCD’s liking seeing as how the Cougars promptly came out of the dressing room and authored a quick 6-0 blitzkrieg inside the initial two minutes, a strong flurry capped off by an acrobatic finish at the cup via junior guard Jake Kumah in transition that not only gave them the hosts their largest lead of the night up until that point at 38-29, but it also more importantly helped to knock A-C back on their heels somewhat given the manner in which the Dutchmen had simply refused to leave their competitor’s side at every possible turn.
And throughout much of the third quarter itself, Country Day would indeed be able to successfully keep Annville-Cleona at least at arm’s length. However, inside the final 20 seconds at least, it may have appeared as if A-C had found a bit of momentum they could try and carry with them heading into the final eight minutes of play once junior guard Ben Morcom took his turn at stepping out from bonus distance and promptly burying a triple to get the Dutchmen back within single figures, 43-35, heading into the last stanza.
However, that desire to build upon that last Dutchmen bucket would not come to fruition as far those dressed in red from head-to-toe were most concerned.
In fact, following another slithery-type move to the tin that should have come complete with a European passport just for good measure by way of game-high scorer, Toby Ashby, this latest two-point addition to what would be his 24-point night’s worth of work helped to give Country Day the two-touchdown lead at 54-40 with just 3:40 left to be played. And from there, the Cougars were largely able to coast home the rest of the way as a pair of runout buckets courtesy of Christian Hoin and Kumah respectively helped to punctuate what had become a decisive 18-point second half displayed defensively by the Cougars as a collective unit against what was certainly a pesky and tricky Annville-Cleona club from start to finish. Then, with the final buzzer blaring out, the final result was formally etched into stone as Country Day was able to snatch up another critical victory en route to what they certainly hopes culminate in another postseason berth by virtue of their hard-fought 64-47 win over Annville-Cleona in this final matchup of the pair’s season series.
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