By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
On X @GDsullysays
EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP — Eastern Regional High girls basketball coach Kristen Przybylski talked about her team getting hot at the right time — the Vikings have won 11 of their last 13 games.
But really, this team is just having fun right now. They lost seven of their first 14 games, but there hasn’t been much pressure on the Vikings. They came into the South Jersey Group 4 state playoffs as a No. 5 seed, and now they find themselves in the sectional semifinals after taking down No. 4 Egg Harbor Township, 49-38, on the road Monday in our Bunting Family Pharmacy Marquee Matchup.
The Vikings looked like a team that came in with nothing to lose, and raced out to a 27-14 first-half lead before keeping any comeback hopes by the Eagles under wraps throughout the second half.
Now, Eastern gets another shot at the No. 1 seed in the bracket, Lenape, a team that has handled the Vikings with ease twice already this season. The Vikings travel to Lenape on Wednesday.
“I can’t say enough about this team, I’m so proud of them,” Przybylski said. “We always start out a little slowly in the season and we turn it up as we go, and this is the right time to do that. I have a lot of tremendous athletes. I have three soccer girls who made the state final in soccer this year, so I think that experience helps leading this young group.”
The moment was never too big for the Vikings from the very start, as they jumped out to a 9-2 lead — holding Egg Harbor Township scoreless for nearly four minutes to start the game. The Eagles showed some life at the end of the first quarter with a 3-pointer from Mariah Newman that shaved the deficit to 11-5, but the Vikings went on an 11-2 run to start the second quarter that put EHT in a 22-7 hole.
Eastern (18-9, 4-4 Olympic American) got a huge first half from senior guard Araba Abanyie, who scored 12 of her game-high 19 points in the first 16 minutes of action.
“She really gets our team going, both on offense and defense,” Przybylski said. “She’s the soccer goalie who led her team to that state finals (appearance). She’s heading to Widener, she’s a great leader, she’s positive, she pushes her teammates and she leads by example.”
“She’s amazing. Attacking the basket, getting and-1s. She was attacking offensively, and defensively getting rebounds. She did great for us,” said senior center Madison Stuart.
“The whole day I was thinking about this game. I’ve already been in this situation in soccer, so I know what it takes. On the court, just knowing I had to get started early and finish strong. I always have trouble closing out games, so I wanted to make sure I did that today,” Abanyie said. “It’s intimidating facing somebody who is ranked higher than you, and we lost to them last year by about 20 points. It’s definitely one of those situations where you know it’s going to be tough, and knowing that is helpful for me because I think I play better against better teams.”
Egg Harbor Township (21-7, 11-1 Cape-Atlantic League National) made a run late in the third quarter, cutting the deficit to 33-25 with 1:19 to play in that frame on a traditional three-point play from star center Averie Harding, but Eastern answered with a three-point play and another free throw from Abanyie to take a commanding 37-25 lead into the fourth quarter. The Eagles never got within nine points the rest of the way. Harding finished with 15 points and fellow senior Ava Kraybill had nine, but the rest of the squad was held in check by the Vikings.
“(EHT) has a tremendous team. Harding is great, Kraybill is great,” Przybylski said. “We had a game plan coming in and we knew if we executed that game plan we’d be good in the end. We’re very athletic and that gives us a lot of options, which is nice.”
The Vikings put three players in double figures, as London Sutton and Stuart complimented Abanyie’s effort with 12 and 10 points, respectively.
“It was amazing. We had a great team effort. We knew this one was going to be a battle, we came in and we believed in each other, and here we are — we came out victorious. I’m so proud,” Stuart said. “I knew going in this was going to be the toughest battle of the season. I prepared, I think we were prepared, and we came away with the win, so it was good for me and it was good for the team. We knew we had to keep it going. Last game we were up by a lot and we slowed down in the second half, so (tonight) we knew we had to keep the pedal to the metal.”
“It sucks when you have a team that only depends on one person, and what’s so great about our team is that you can’t just pick one person to guard, you can’t even pick two people — it’s every single one of us who can contribute at any time. It’s never just one person,” Abanyie added.
Now it’s on to Lenape, which beat No. 9 Williamstown in its quarterfinal matchup and has lost to only Gloucester Catholic and Paul VI since the calendar flipped to 2025.
“We have a big game coming up and we want revenge,” Stuart said. “We’re showing people. We’re the underdogs, but we’re showing people we can really play.”
Added Przybylski, “their confidence is going up. We peak late, for some reason. We’ve been telling them, ‘play like it’s your last game.’ And they do.”
Abanyie said she’s soaking in every moment of this last ride. Next fall she’ll be off to Widener University to play soccer.
“This is great. Every single game matters to me, and that’s what I’m playing for because these are the last few games I’m going to see with my teammates and friends,” she said. “That’s something I really want to fight for. The energy is great. We were just in the locker room cheering. Every single practice we just try to be with each other and have fun. I think everyone knows we want to win. Everyone wants to be here, and everyone wants to win.”
WHAT’S NEXT: No. 5 Eastern Regional at No. 1 Lenape in the South Jersey Group 4 semifinals, Wednesday, time TBD. Egg Harbor Township’s season is complete.
