Chantilly Boys Bounce Back With Win at West Potomac

Chantilly boys’ basketball coach Jim Smith has run one of the stronger programs in the Northern Region in recent years, so he knows good basketball when he sees it. The Chargers’ roster the last four seasons was full of all-stars like John Manning, Jake Weigand, Devin Ballam and Kethan Savage – three of whom were Division I basketball recruits.

“That arguably is the best class to ever come through Chantilly High School,” said Smith of his senior lead squad that went 18-7 but lost in the regional tournament to Lake Braddock.  “How many public high schools have three Division I players in the same class? We’ve been very fortunate to have that. … [But] we’re kind of starting from scratch again.”

Smith is being honest when he says his team, along with a handful of others in the Concorde District, are rebuilding. And the ups-and-downs of a team that’s still “a work in progress” were on display Friday night at West Potomac.

The Chargers hung on for a 60-58 win, but a more seasoned team would have pulled away in the final minute. Instead, Chantilly, leading 59-53 with 1:10 to play after Trey Coates stole the ball at midcourt and found Deandre Harris for an easy lay-up, saw its lead deteriorate until the Wolverines had the ball in their end with 10 seconds left and a chance to tie the game.

West Potomac guard Brandon Pressley, who led his team with 17 points, found himself with an open shooting window just to the right of the foul line. When he let the ball go, it looked on target, but it bounced out after hitting both sides of the rim. Chantilly’s players managed to hold on to the rebound to prevent another shot before the final buzzer.

During the final 70 seconds, the Chargers missed the front-end of two one-and-ones and only hit one of four free throw tries. They made just five of 13 free throws overall.

“We’ll shoot a lot of free throws tomorrow,” said Smith after the game. “We made it a lot harder. Coming over here, I told our kids, even if we had a really good team, coming over here and beating a good West Potomac team is always tough.”

If it hadn’t been for a stellar second half by junior forward Brian Sydnor, who scored all of his game-high 19 points in the final 11 minutes, the Chargers might have been looking at an 0-2 start after dropping the home opener to Madison.

“I was just trying to be more aggressive and put my team in a position to win,” said Sydnor.

“He needs to play like that for us to beat good teams, and he played like a man tonight,” said Smith. “It’s nice to see.”

The Chargers were down 21-6 early in their game against Madison, but on Friday, they jumped out to a 17-9 lead heading into the second quarter. Senior captain Brady Caslavka (13 points) made back-to-back 3-pointers early in the game to give the Chargers an 8-5 lead that they never gave up until West Potomac’s Pressley scored seven straight points to make it 38-37 late in the third quarter.

“Brady hit a couple threes early to get us going, and you hit a couple shots, you play with more confidence,” said Smith. “Getting off to a better start was good.”

Chantilly faces Lee, Yorktown, Thomas Jefferson and McLean before hosting the Pohanka Chantilly Classic Dec. 27-29. The Chargers move into Concorde District play after winter break. They’ll start off with a road game against a Westfield team (Jan. 6) that's expected to be tops in the district and should challenge for a regional crown.

“Westfield has got everybody back, and this senior group is what they’ve been pointing towards since everyone was a freshman,” Smith said of his team’s cross-town rival. “This should be their year and the rest of us, it should be interesting to see how soon some of our young guys grow up.”

Notes:

The Chantilly girls’ team rebounded from a loss earlier this week with a 51-20 victory in the night’s opening contest.