Sidwell makes most of trip to Hawaii; Marshall swaps height for hustle
The Sidwell Friends girls’ basketball team left for Hawaii last week in the hopes of putting a rare defeat in the rearview mirror. Since 2020, the No. 1 Quakers have lost just four games. Two have come in December, when the team often takes on a relentless, national nonconference schedule.
Their second game of this season was against Pennsylvania’s Westtown, and it ended in a 52-49 defeat.
“I think we got better in that game,” Coach Tamika Dudley said. “Yes, we took a loss, but I think we showed some glimpses of what this group can really be. … I want to be realistic. We’re not going to win every single game. But it’s about what you take away from each game.”
Four days later, Sidwell left for Hawaii. The Quakers were taking part in the ’Iolani Classic, a prestigious eight-team, three-day tournament in Honolulu. Dudley viewed the trip as beneficial on two fronts: It gave her team a chance to test itself against more elite opposition, and it provided time to build early-season chemistry. In between games, the group went to a luau, hit the beach and visited Pearl Harbor.
Advertisement
On the court, the Quakers showed no signs of discouragement after the loss to Westtown. They topped Hawaii’s Kamehameha Kapalama in the quarterfinals and California’s Clovis West in the semifinals. In the championship game against national power Sierra Canyon, Sidwell emerged with a gritty 49-48 win. Senior forward Zania Socka-Nguemen, a UCLA commit, scored the winning basket off an inbound play with four seconds left.
“I saw resilience in Hawaii,” Dudley said. “You always want to see if your team has the heart to push through some adversity early, and I think they did that. Each game challenged us in a different way.”
Sidwell (4-1) was originally scheduled to go to Florida soon after the trip to Hawaii, but that event was canceled shortly before the season. So the team now has a break of nearly a month: Its next game is Jan. 4 against Independent School League foe Bullis.
Advertisement
“I’m a big believer in using Christmastime to rest, train, recover and prepare for the second half of the season,” Dudley said. “I’m never afraid of giving them time off.”
— Michael Errigo
Marshall swaps height for hustle
There was a face-scrunching, ball-slamming frustration that came with playing the Marshall boys last year. Nobody in Northern Virginia was slower — and flourished more at that pace — than the Statesmen’s University of Virginia-style pack-line defense, which held teams to 41.2 points per game and helped deliver a 22-4 record.
A year later, the Statesmen are 7-0, conceding even fewer points. But their identity as an irritant has taken on a new form: They’re flying.
“It’s exciting,” Marshall Coach Jerry Lin said. “We’re getting up and down, shooting more threes. We’re adapting.”
Since taking over at Marshall in 2019, Lin has shown enthusiasm for tailoring the Statesmen’s system around their personnel. That meant with the graduation of Marshall’s entire frontcourt and district player of the year Matthew Lenert, the Statesmen dropped height for hustle.
Advertisement
Their undersized top three — seniors Jose Fudd, Jason Penn and Omar Phillips — have enjoyed the pace and open looks, but they feel there’s more work to be done. Fudd, who got stronger this past summer and has thrived as a stretch forward, is still getting in sync with the guards. The team’s stamina improved in the offseason, though with pace came turnovers.
“In our fall league, Lin said we looked like we were in midseason form,” Fudd said. “But we can’t be stuck in midseason form. We have to be even better.”
Adaptability makes Marshall a viable candidate to stick around Northern Virginia’s upper rung. Friday’s 54-47 win over rival Madison, which avenged last season’s region semifinal loss to the Warhawks, was indicative of as much — and demonstrated the effectiveness of Marshall’s system. Fudd connected on six threes, most of which came from NBA range. Two of those threes, plus a charge drawn by 5-foot-7 guard Osteen Suguru, sealed the game in the final minute.
Advertisement
“He plays like he’s 7 feet tall,” Penn said of Suguru. “He’s a dog.”
— Spencer Nusbaum
Players of the week
Samia Greene, Eastern: The senior dropped 42 points for the Ramblers in a 70-48 win over Coolidge. Eastern is 4-1 under new coach Lonnie Harrell after a winless 2022-23 season.
Thomas Farrell, Whitman: The marksman made 6 of 11 threes and scored 23 points Dec. 11 at Wheaton. He followed it up two days later by scoring a career-high 27 at Kennedy, making 7 of 8 long-range attempts. The Vikings have won four straight after a season-opening loss.
Anya Rahman, Langley: Before Friday, Robinson hadn’t allowed a team to score 40 points since last year’s season opener. Then came Rahman, who scored 17 points to lead the Saxons to a 43-39 victory. Her efforts lift Langley into the Top 20.
Shane Pendergrass, Mount Zion Prep: The sophomore wing scored 20 points as the Warriors beat Philadelphia power West Catholic, 70-43, at the inaugural Champions Classic at St. John’s.
Games to watch
Jackson-Reed girls at Eastern, Monday, 5:30 p.m.
Advertisement
St. Andrew’s boys at St. John’s, Tuesday, 7:30 p.m.
Osbourn Park girls at Centreville, Thursday, 7:30 p.m.
Southern boys at Broadneck, Friday, 6:45 p.m.
Howard stays undefeated in county play
Howard got a long-awaited coronation in last year’s Maryland Class 3A girls’ state championship.
A 64-52 win over Poly crowned the Lions for the first time since 1994 and felt like the culmination of a dominant climb. Howard went 70-2 over the past three seasons and entered this year on a 58-game winning streak against county foes.
The title looked to be the end of that run. Sixty-three of the Lions’ 64 points in that championship game were scored by departing players — seniors Gabrielle Kennerly, Samiyah Nasir and Jenna Vetter and sophomore star Meghan Yarnevich, who transferred to Bullis.
Some wondered if Scott Robinson, who has coached Howard since 2011, would step away and go out on top. Robinson reflected on that decision for a few weeks after the season, he said, but returned.
Advertisement
“I just thought, as long as I had the health to be able to do it, that I wanted to do it,” he said.
The Lions (4-2) are not the juggernaut they had been, but they have won their first four Howard County games to extend their streak to 62. They started the season by holding one of the county’s top contenders, River Hill, to 28 points in a five-point victory.
Howard has held its opponent below 30 points in each of its wins. The lone returning scorer from the win over Poly, Alana Harrison, has been an impactful defender. Senior Oluwadamilola Daniel leads the Lions in scoring after coming off the bench last season.
“We just have to play hard. Nothing’s going to come easy,” Robinson said. “Hard work is going to be the only way that we’re going to be successful.”
— Varun Shankar
Gwynn Park starts strong in its ‘Last Dance’
Gwynn Park boys’ coach Rob Garner has watched his core group of seniors grow together for years inside gymnasiums across Prince George’s County. Several of the Yellow Jackets have played four years of varsity basketball with one another, making this season the last time they can chase a state title together.
Advertisement
“We kind of copycat the documentary with the Chicago Bulls and Michael Jordan, when he talked about ‘The Last Dance,’” Garner said. “… We say it every day.”
The season is still young for the tightknit squad, but the Yellow Jackets have impressed early. Gwynn Park has won each of its first four games by at least 20 points, including a dominant 77-44 win over High Point on Saturday in the DMV Tip-Off Classic in Waldorf.
The Yellow Jackets’ three best players — seniors Demarcus Daniel Jr., Tony Pope and Ty Bevins — have played together throughout their tenures at Gwynn Park. Pope and Bevins go back further, having grown up playing youth league basketball together since they were 7 years old.
Daniel led the way in his team’s latest win, contributing 29 points, eight rebounds and four steals. Pope recorded 21 points and six assists.
— Noah Ferguson
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7uK3SoaCnn6Sku7G70q1lnKedZMCxu9GtqmhqYGeAcH2RaGhxZ6Oesbixy6Vkm52emrOqwNJmq6uhoGK1osPAoqBmpZGnwKmty6VkrK%2BRpcButMSinqGsXZ3CtMDLnmY%3D