SLCC has a rare shot at national title

HUTCHINSON, Kan. — On Tuesday, they had "The Comeback." On Wednesday, they had "The Blowout." And now the Bruins have — as SLCC guard Brian Green calls it — "a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."

Sparked by yet another suffocating defensive performance and another big outing by Green, Salt Lake moved within one game of winning the NJCAA basketball championship after throttling Three Rivers Community College 68-50 on Friday night.

That, of course, means tonight just might be remembered by the Bruins as "The Grand Finale" of the most successful season in the program's history.

SLCC (32-3) will take on South Plains College (29-3) of Levelland, Texas, tonight at 7 in the Sports Arena for a shot at the school's first hoops national title.

Green again led the Bruins in scoring with five 3-pointers and 19 points, including 11 in the first half when SLCC seized control of the semifinal.

"This is a good feeling. We knew we could make it here. We believed in ourselves. We believed in our coaches and what they said. We listened to them," Green said. "We will come out hard tomorrow and play hard, play our defense. It feels good that we can play in the national championship."

Something else that obviously feels good right now for the Bruins, who rallied from down 11 late in Game 1 and then won by 29 in the quarterfinals, is their propensity for shutting down opponents' offenses.

The Pirates, who average 80 points and 51 percent shooting as team, struggled to make any serious runs at SLCC. They scored just 20 points in the first half — as the Bruins grabbed an 11-point halftime lead — and missed 35 of 53 attempts for an uncharacteristic 34 percent shooting effort.

"Intensity erases a lot of mistakes and good ball pressure," said SLCC coach Norm Parrish. "Defensively that's been our calling card all year. The guys really believe in it."

That's why it isn't merely a cliche or a coincidence that Salt Lake has both the nation's stingiest defense and only one victory left to claim a junior college championship.

"We got beat by a very good team tonight," said Three Rivers coach Gene Bess, whose program has been in 15 NJCAA tournaments. "These guys took us out of about everything we tried. ... They kept us from swinging the ball, from running our offense. They either had us well-scouted, or we just chose to do way too much one-on-one stuff."

It looked like both.

The Pirates grabbed an early 4-2 lead, but SLCC quickly answered with an 11-2 run thanks mostly to Vassy Banny and Andy Palmer. Banny had a three in the spurt and then found Palmer open inside twice for layups.