Perkiomen Valley’s Grace Galbavy is ‘on another level,’ and college programs have taken notice

Perkiomen Valley girls basketball coach John Russo took his daughter, Cameron, to a shoot around at the high school several times per week this summer.

They were typically joined by Vikings junior Grace Galbavy, who brought the same message with her each time: “No days off, Cammie,” she told the eighth grader. “No days off.”

Galbavy arrived at Perkiomen Valley last fall after her family moved into the school district from Upper Perkiomen. Russo saw the talent and the tools Galbavy possessed as an opponent during her freshman season in the Pioneer Athletic Conference.

And in the last year, he’s had a first hand look at what truly makes the highly-recruited 6-foot wing special.

“I’ll tell you what, we have a group of kids who really love the game of basketball, but she is on another level,” Russo said. “She just has a way about her that is unique for the love of the game. In my opinion, she has to go to a school at the next level that will embrace her ability to want to be around the sport 24/7.”

Galbavy started in soccer, where she first dreamed of playing professionally on the pitch. Then it became pretty clear she had the potential to thrive on the basketball court.

She’s a player who got a gym membership to give her another place to shoot when the school is closed on Sundays. She’s a player who loves to watch film, even sometimes a little too much during the school day. She’s a player consistently obsessed with getting better.

“In anything I’ve done, I’ve wanted to achieve the most,” Galbavy said. “In school, in sports — I figured out I was pretty good at basketball. I love the sport, so why would I not want to play it as long as I could?”

Galbavy grew up in the Upper Perkiomen school district, a big fish in a small pond. She played against older competition all the time, playing up on the sixth grade team when she was in third grade.

A connection through her cousin led her out of the area to play travel ball in sixth grade for Soudertons’s ICBA team. That’s where she met Matt Harrington, a former standout at North Penn who played at Bucknell. Workouts with Harrington gave Galbavy the foundation of her moveset, and she’s continued to grow and grow.

“It’s kind of just been the whole time me figuring things out because I’m not the person that has a parent that trains them,” Galbavy said. “It’s kind of just been me, like going to my coach’s house and doing moves. I just fell in love with it, so I just love to play whenever I can.”

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Playing against older competition, Galbavy was typically on the smaller side. But a six-inch growth spurt in middle school had her slapping the backboard in eighth grade. She has guard skills in a long, lanky frame that she calls the “prototype body build for DI basketball.”

She was a known commodity by the time she got to high school with multiple prep school programs recruiting her. She decided to stay at Upper Perk for her freshman season, when she averaged 18.9 points and took a group that broke a 60-game league losing streak the year prior to the league and district playoffs.

Her status as a prospect elevated following that season as she played for the Philly Rise Nike Elite Youth Basketball League program for the first time. Pittsburgh, Harvard, Towson and Temple all offered scholarships that summer.

Her spotlight grew bigger last season at Perk Valley. She averaged 13.3 points, 8.3 rebounds, 3.4 assists, 2.0 steals, and 1.9 blocks to earn second team all-state honors for the Pioneer Athletic Conference and District 1-6A champions. After playing on a high school team with as many as seven future college basketball players, her shine continued with the Rise again this summer, winning a 16U national championship as more of a role player alongside some of the top players in the country like Westtown’s Jordyn Palmer.

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“The team’s that I’ve gotten to play on these past two years, I have great players wherever I go,” Galbavy said. “I can never complain. I’m never playing down. They keep me in check every practice. Rise keeps me in check. I feel like I’m never wavering between good and bad basketball.”

Monmouth, St. John’s, Columbia, DePaul, Penn, Rhode Island, Davidson, Delaware, Fairfield, Bowling Green and Fordham all extended scholarship offers to her this summer.

College programs came to Perk Valley open gyms this fall to see Galbavy and her teammates, including classmate Quinn Boettigner, who recently committed to Navy. She added Northeastern, Richmond, Quinnipiac, and Yale to her list of offers in September and October.

Galbavy has about 40 programs recruiting her. It’s an expansive list of schools from various conferences and levels that she has yet to narrow down.

“It’s great to make connections and stuff like that,” Galbavy said. “It’s great talking to coaches and I’m so blessed to have so many options, so I can’t complain about any of the process so far.”

Galbavy is averaging 20.1 points in her junior season at Perk Valley. And on Dec. 21. she surpassed 1,000 career points against her former team in Upper Perk.

Russo watched her differ to her new teammates at the start of last season. By the end of the year she started to assert herself on the game. She’s continued to pick her spots to take over this season, making the Vikings an even more dangerous threat.

“I feel so much more comfortable,” Galbavy said. “I’m definitely liking my three-point shot, and coach and my teammates have a lot more trust in me.”

Her coach has noticed an improvement in her three-point shot, crediting the work she puts in on the shooting machine in the Vikings’ gym. Galbavy said her passing game has also become notable, sprinkling in a few highlight dimes a game.

Russo has seen Galbavy turn into a lockdown defender for his team this season. She and junior guard Lena Stein can take away the two top players on an opponents’ team. It’s been noticeable during the Vikings’ tough matchups against Penn Charter, the reigning Inter-Ac League champion, and Sanford School (Del.), the reigning Delaware state champ.

The Vikings have a deep group beyond Galbavy, Boettinger, and Stein with junior point guard Bella Bacani and junior guard Julia Smith both multi-year starters. Senior Kutztown-bound Anna Stein and junior forward Grace Miley are coming off the bench, but have started in previous seasons.

Their terrific campaign ended prematurely in 2022-23 with an overtime loss to Archbishop Carroll in the second round of states. They entered the season as the favorites in the league, district, and state. They’ve shown no signs that they can’t end the season with all three titles before Galbavy starts to sift through her list of schools this spring.

“Sky’s the limit. I have faith in my teammates and I know they have faith in me,” Galbavy said. “They’ve worked so hard, I’ve worked so hard. The coaching staff prepares us every game. If we play our hardest, we really should come out on top a lot of the time.”

This story was produced as part of a partnership between The Inquirer and City of Basketball Love, a nonprofit news organization that covers high school and college basketball in the Philadelphia area while also helping mentor the next generation of sportswriters. This collaboration will help boost coverage of the city’s vibrant amateur basketball scene, from the high school ranks up through the Big 5 and beyond.