You don't have to score to get playing time for Lenape. You do need to play defense.
Hand scored three against Paul VI, five against Cherokee, and two against Shawnee. But he was a big reason why the Indians, the No. 7 team in The Inquirer's South Jersey rankings, went 3-0 in those games.
Not that Hand was alone. He might have been charged with the task of guarding Paul VI's Ron Curry, Cherokee's Conor Kelly, and Shawnee's Dan Mumford, each of whom leads his team in scoring average.
But Hand had plenty of help from his friends in limiting those three explosive guards to a combined 15 points.
"Sawyer buys into what we're doing," Guittar said. "He also trusts his teammates."
The Indians (11-2) have not allowed more than 57 points in a game, and they've held nine of 13 opponents to fewer than 50.
But they've tightened down in the last three games. Their big week included a 53-45 victory over then-No. 1 Paul VI, a 48-40 victory over Cherokee, and Thursday night's defensive clinic against No. 10 Shawnee.
"It shows we're getting better," Guittar said.
Shawnee (10-4) played solid defense, too. For the longest time, this looked like first-team-to-40-wins.
"Their defense is always good," Shawnee coach Joe Kessler said. "We played pretty good defense, too, but the game got away from us a little in the fourth quarter."
Lenape finally shook loose at the offensive end in the fourth quarter, as Brown scored five of his 14, senior forward Evan Ward scored five of his 11, and senior guard Kyle Robostello scored five of his 10.
But the 32-minute constant for the Indians was their defensive intensity. They pressured every Shawnee pass, contested every shot, snared every defensive rebound.
