District Champion Flyers Are Rockford, IL Bound
The Sandhills Community College basketball team qualified for the NJCAA Division III national tournament by defeating Prince George's CC 77-72 for the Mid-Atlantic District title on Saturday in Largo, MD.
The 10th ranked in Division III Flyers improved to 26-7, capturing their fifth district title in Coach Mike Apple's 11 years at Sandhills. Winners of national titles in 2012 and 2020, the team will be making its fourth national tournament appearance in a row.
Hosted this season by Rock Valley College in Rockford, IL on March 9-12, the seeding selections for the 12-team field will be announced live on an NJCAA Network broadcast at 2 p.m. on Wednesday.
Leading 45-31 at halftime, the Flyers went almost seven minutes without a basket until a jumper by Camron Zachary made it 49-41 with 13:20 remaining in the game.
On an afternoon that the two teams were a combined 4-for-37 on shots from beyond the arc, a timely second trey of the game by K.J. Perry upped the Flyer advantage to 52-44 at the 13-minute mark.
Freshman Kendall Wooldridge helped the Flyer cause by scoring all 11 of his points in the game in the final 9:56, but the Owls went on to close the gap to four points on a number of occasions, and later to three at 75-72 with 12 seconds remaining in the game.
A pair of free throws by Joey McMullin then sealed the Flyers' 16th victory in the last 17 games.
Apple was pleased with the performance of a mostly freshmen guard corp that has now helped the team win three pressure-packed post season games after losing the availability of a number of key members during the season.
In addition to Wooldridge, Chris Hunter and sophomore transfer Darryl McCaster were among the other first-year Flyers, making a difference against the Owls.
"Kendall was really big down the stretch and gave us some baskets we sorely needed.", the coach said.
"The things we've done, going through a lot of different lineups, and watching the development of our freshmen, and the way they play as a unit, made this rewarding and extra sweet."
Other double figure scorers for the Flyers included last week's NJCAA Division III Player of the Week Bryan Quiller with 15 points, McMullin with 12 and McCaster with 10.
Apple also thought 6-foot-9 Zac Sledge's presence down low was a factor in the Owls' shooting percentage for the game of 27.8.
Other teams that qualified for the trip to Rockford with district tournament wins on Saturday include No. 9 ranked Dallas-Eastfield (25-6), No. 15 Rock Valley (22-9) and unranked Community College of Philadelphia (20-6). The other four automatic qualifiers will be determined by games played on Sunday. Four at large selections will also be made to complete the field of teams.
Sandhills – Wooldridge 5 1-1 11, Hunter 3 1-2 7, McCaster 4 2-2 10, Sledge 3 2-2 8, Quiller 5 5-7 15, Perry 2 0-0 6, Hanani 0 0-1 0, Coleman 0 0-0 0, McMullin 5 2-2 12, Zachary 2 2-2 6, Nelson 1 0-0 2 Totals 30 15-19 77. Prince George's – Jackson 3 2-3 8, Rebstock 0 0-0 0, McMillan 4 5-8 13, Perry 4 6-6 14, Wilkes 4 3-4 11, Cooke 2 6-7 10, Marr 0 0-0 0, Dunlap 3 4-4 12, Muten 2 0-0 4, Simon 0 0-0 0 Totals 22 26-32 72. Three-point goals: SCC 2 (Perry 2); PG 2 (Dunlap 2).
C. Bergmann