NEWARK — Salesianum closed out an ambitious 2021-22 basketball season with a loss to Tower Hill in the state championship game on March 12 at the Bob Carpenter Center, but the Sals had plenty of highlights during the season.
After a season-opening win over St. Andrew’s on Dec. 9, the Sals embarked on a six-game jaunt over the next three weeks against some stiff competition from the Philadelphia area and Maryland. Over a seven-day stretch, they faced Imhotep Charter (Pa.) at home and Neumann-Goretti (Pa.) at the Grail Sports Complex in Elsmere, then had road games in Maryland against Bullis School and John Carroll.
After a few days off, Salesianum was back in action against Roman Catholic (Pa.) at the Chase Fieldhouse before taking on another Philadelphia Catholic League opponent in Bonner-Prendergast at Widener University. Roman Catholic and Neumann Goretti met in the PCL semifinals a few weeks ago at the Palestra in Philadelphia.
They lost all six of those games, but the foundation had been set for the rest of the season. Nine days after losing their sixth straight, the Sals traveled to St. Elizabeth for a Sunday matinee. The Vikings were the first of eight consecutive ranked Delaware opponents on the schedule.
Salesianum won that one, 54-35, and they kept winning. In order, they took down William Penn, Middletown, Smyrna, Appoquinimink, Tower Hill and Sanford. Finally, Caravel hung a loss on the Sals won four of their final five regular-season games, including the finale at Paulsboro (N.J.), who entered the game with a record of 20-2.
The games got a little bit closer in the postseason, with Sallies the No. 1 seed. Laurel traveled to Wilmington from Sussex County and lost by 11. A quarterfinal matchup with Dover followed. Birkenheuer Memorial Gymnasium was sold-out and rocking as the Sals and Senators battled into overtime before Justin Molen’s three-pointer proved to be the difference in a 57-51 win.
That earned Salesianum a trip to the Bob Carpenter Center and a highly anticipated rematch with Howard. The Wildcats had beaten the Sals three weeks earlier, but the Sals jumped out to a big lead, then held on as Howard made a comeback attempt late in the third and throughout the fourth quarter. Salesianum reached the final for the first time since 2015 with a 57-51 win.
The first game between the teams at Tower Hill was on the minds of observers as the game approached, but this was a completely different animal. The Hillers fell behind, 2-0, on a bucket by the Sals’ Isaiah Hynson, but Tower would put on a clinic after that. The next four made buckets were three-pointers from Dean Shepherd, Davis Bland (twice) and Dylan Shepherd for a 12-2 lead. By the end of the first quarter, it was 18-4
The Hillers kept the long-distance assault coming, and the outcome was never in doubt. Bland finished with seven triples and his team 13. Salesianum played most of the night without Molen, who injured an ankle late in the semifinal, and Justin Hinds, who missed the game after being ejected from the Howard game.
But overall, the season was a positive. Molen, Sam Walsh, Brett O’Hara and Dariyon Williams are among the seven seniors who will graduate, but Hynson, Hunds, Kareem Thomas and Quinn O’Hara are all sophomores. Brandon Baffone and Deuce Mutts will be seniors next season. In addition, the junior varsity and freshman teams went a combined 33-3.
Currently, there are 12 games on the 2022-23 schedule, beginning Dec. 8 at St. Andrew’s and wrapping up Feb. 18 at Howard.
Photos by Don Blake and Jason Winchell.