A parade for the unheralded champs of St Martin de Porres

On the same weekend that a certain men's basketball team at a certain Main Line college flew to Houston to compete in a certain college basketball tournament, 16 boys boarded a school bus in North Philadelphia and settled in for a seven-hour ride across the state.

By weekend's end, everyone in Philadelphia knew what had happened in Houston. Only a few - outside of those packing a high school gymnasium in Erie - knew that the boys' basketball team at St. Martin de Porres Catholic School was on its way home with a trophy, too.

For the first time in its history, the little school in the heart of North Philadelphia, whose team practices in its auditorium because it has no gym, had won the Catholic Youth League's state basketball championship.

Villanova University got a parade through Center City. St. Martin's settled for a parade outside the school, down the 2300 block of Lehigh Avenue.

Thursday morning, 400 cheering children in maroon uniforms lined the street. The nuns had persuaded construction workers down the street to stop drilling for 15 minutes or so, and enlisted the 22nd Police District to cordon off the block.

The 76ers drum line led the basketball team, its members grinning shyly, down the middle of the street.

"I could feel it in my heart - those drums," said Elijah Taylor, 14, a 6-foot-8 eighth grader who carried the championship trophy into the school. At a pep rally in the auditorium, he took the stage to screams and applause. A portable basketball hoop sat folded in the corner.

Sister Nancy Fitzgerald, principal at St. Martin's for 20 years, took the stage and asked the students to recite the school's zip code - 19132, one of the city's poorest and most crime-ridden. But at St. Martin, which has been in the neighborhood, under various parish names, for about 100 years, the numbers are a source of pride.

"We represent what's right in the zip code of 19132," said the Rev. Stephen Thorne, the church's pastor. "In this school, you are safe - and we expect the best of you."

Taylor and his teammates said they barely knew each other at the start of the year - but they went on to win about 70 games together, and soon caught the attention of high school head coaches, who began scouting their games. The six boys set to graduate this year are hoping to be recruited onto some of the city's most elite high school teams.

They were the only all-black team in the CYO state tournament.

"We didn't feel like we were being looked down on, but we were looked at a little bit different," said Jasir Cook, 14.

"Well, we beat them," Taylor said with a laugh.

At Thursday's ceremony, the team received medals from the school's board of directors, citations from City Council, and standing ovations from the 400 students in the auditorium. Fran Dunphy, Temple University's men's basketball coach, told the team he was "as proud as proud can be of you."

As the children filed out, Dunphy came over to shake Fitzgerald's hand. She glanced over to the basketball hoop, still folded in the corner, and the championship team, taking a few final photos, beaming next to their trophy.

"So," she said, turning to Dunphy. "You want to buy us a gym?"

awhelan@philly.com

215-854-2961@aubreyjwhelan