Delcohoops.com

By Matt Smith

Chester High’s 25th District 1 basketball championship would not be a reality if not for the heroics of sophomore Kyree Womack. The 5-foot-5 guard drilled a miraculous 3-pointer as time ticked down in regulation Saturday to send the Class 5A championship game against Radnor into overtime.

The Clippers went on to defeat the Raptors, 66-65, for their second consecutive title. This one shall be known as the Kyree Womack game.

The diminutive Womack has an apt description of himself, consisting of three words, in his Twitter profile: “Heart over height.”

He showed just that Saturday afternoon at the Liacouras Center. When the Clippers needed a clutch basket, Womack didn’t disappoint. Chester coach Keith Taylor revealed what he was thinking as Womack lofted the 3-ball from the top of the circle.

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By Matthew DeGeorge

Kyree Womack received the inbounds pass with 11.1 seconds left Saturday afternoon, set his shoulders upcourt and knew exactly what he wanted to do. He jump-stopped 29 feet from the basket with the confidence of a player in the lane, coiled and let fly.

Three months ago, Womack didn’t know if he’d be in that position. The sophomore guard had contributed as a freshman to a District 1 title for Chester, but when an opportunity opened at Roman Catholic, he transferred to the Catholic League powerhouse.

That arrangement didn’t work out, though. So by the mid-semester break, Womack re-enrolled in Chester, waiting with his teammates through a four-week COVID-19 stoppage. As his mom wrangled the paperwork to finalize the switch and ensure postseason eligibility, Womack worked and hoped.

And when the moment was biggest Saturday, he rose to it.

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By Joseph Santoliquito 

Everyone was jumping up and down, and jumping on each other in a black-and-orange mosh pit. Chester’s Kyree Womack wanted to do the same. The problem was his body wasn’t too willing. He had his sneakers off and was walking gingerly in socks limping on both legs at Temple’s Liacouras Center on Saturday.

His Chester teammates refer to Womack as “Benjamin Button,” since he can have the tendency to walk around like an old man. The Clippers’ sophomore guard has battled bad feet and knees all season. Sometimes, he’ll get held out of practice to ease the stress on his sore limbs.

When the pressure is on, however, Womack certainly doesn’t move like a geriatric. There’s an easy alacrity to his game, especially in tense moments, like in the PIAA District 1 5A championship against Radnor.

Womack’s three-point bank shot sent the game into overtime with 4.7 seconds left in regulation and his driving layup with 7.1 seconds left in overtime won it for Chester, 66-65.

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By Matthew DeGeorge

The last time Chester’s boys basketball team was made to wait this long for a game, it was late December and the team was in a COVID-19 pause. The remedy for all that down time was a stretch of five games in six days, a run of games that includes the last time the Clippers tasted defeat.

This time, Chester has cooled its heels since last Saturday’s District 1 Class 5A semifinal, withstanding a week-long pause in the normally hectic postseason for Saturday’s district final quadruple extravaganza.

Coach Keith Taylor hopes the reward is, again, similarly satisfying.

“It’s been tough,” Taylor said Thursday. “It feels like we’ve been waiting forever. Saturday to Saturday, that’s a long time.”

The Clippers hope the wait is worthwhile, for Saturday’s 2 p.m. tipoff in the District 1 Class 5A final at Temple University, the second-seeded Clippers taking on No. 1 Radnor.

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By Josh Verlin

For Gregg Downer, Saturday’s District 1 Class 6A boys championship is a chance at long-awaited revenge.

It was Downer’s senior year at Penncrest High School when he and his Lions went up against Norristown, led by future NFL quarterback Steve Bono, and fell short, 59-53, against the Eagles in the 1980 district championship.

“I can remember how good Steve Bono was and how exciting it was for me, a Philadelphia kid, to play at the Palestra, how crowded the gym was,” Downer recalled by phone Thursday night. “It’s the one game in my career when I came out of the tunnel where I couldn’t find my parents.

“I’ve been waiting 42 years to get another crack at Norristown,” the Lower Merion head coach added.

Saturday night at Temple University’s Liacouras Center, Downer’s going to have his chance, when his second-seeded Aces will attempt to defend their district title against the upstart No. 12 seed Eagles, who are on the verge of pulling off a championship run almost no one saw coming.

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Webmaster’s note: This game will be video streamed by Lower Merion HS. You can find the game at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70SiznZ1d2M

By Josh Verln

If Radnor’s boys needed any reminder of how long it’s been since their program last competed for a district championship, they got one at their District 1 Class 5A semifinal win over Upper Moreland. That’s when one of the members of the last Radnor boys’ squad came up to introduce himself, to pass along words of good wishes for Jamie Chadwin and his Raptors. 

A gentleman who was pushing 80 years old, reliving the memories from that 1960-61 year season, speaking to a group of 16-to-18-year-olds whose parents weren’t even around the last time the Main Line public school hoisted a District 1 trophy.

It’s been exactly six decades since Radnor’s even had the opportunity to play for a district title, a year after longtime head coach Ellis Dwyer led the team to the last of his seven district titles, a reign that started in 1945 and continued in ‘46, ‘49, ‘51, ‘56 and ‘60 before the final win in ‘61, a 68-59 decision over Norristown.

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Webmaster’s note: Delcohoops.com will be AUDIO broadcasting the game LIVE tomorrow starting at 1:50.  We are not aware of any video streaming available for this game.