Flyers Players, Coaches Bring Experience to National Championship Stage
The No. 1 ranked Sandhills Community College basketball team has been named the No. 1 overall seed in the 12-team field for the NJCAA Division III National Championship to be held at Herkimer College in Herkimer, NY on March 15-18.
The Flyers (28-3) along with No. 2 seed Dallas College-North Lake (25-6), No. 3 Brookdale, NJ (27-3) and No. 4 Northern Essex, MA (33-1) receive first round byes into next Thursday's quarterfinal round. Dallas-North Lake is the defending national champion.
Making it's fifth trip in a row to nationals, Coach Mike Apple's squad will face the winner of Wednesday's game between No. 8 seed Prince George's, MD (24-4) and No. 9 Mohawk Valley, NY (26-3) at 2 p.m. on Thursday.
The tournament continues with semi-final and consolation round games on Friday, leading up to the national title contest at 5 p.m. on Saturday. All of the tournament games will be live-streamed on NJCAA Network Pay-Per-View.
Apple, the team's assistant coaches and players, along with other Flyers' supporters, gathered in the Game Room at the Dempsey Student Center on Wednesday afternoon for the NJCAA Network announcement of the tournament bracket.
The Flyers' side also includes No. 5 seed Northampton, PA (28-3) and No. 12 Dutchess, NY (17-12). On the other side are No. 6 Fulton-Montgomery, NY (20-6), No. 7 Butler County, PA (20-4), the team the Flyers defeated for the Mid-Atlantic District title, No. 10 Rochester, MN (20-7) and No. 11 Dupage, IL (20-13).
Assistant coaches Tramaine Pride, Daquain Towns and Markell Lotharp were all members of Apple's 2012 squad that won the program's first of two national titles in Loch Sheldrake, NY about 100 miles south of Herkimer. Towns was the tournament MVP and Lotharp earned All-American honors.
"Unlike this team, we were an eighth seed and didn't go with a lot of expectations," Towns recalls. "We just kind of wanted to put the Sandhills name on the map and prove to everyone else why we were there.
"This team has guys that have already played in two national tournaments so we're kind of trying to redeem ourselves for what we did last year because we didn't play too well."
Last year's No. 7 seeded squad got off to a cold-shooting start in losing it's opener to Joliet, IL at the tournament held in Rockford, IL, and then fell to Community College of Philadelphia in a consolation game.
Sophomore guard Chris Hunter was asked what he took away from that experience.
"We have to come out in the first game and play hard," he said. "We have to beat the other team from the get-go. We have to play as a team. We can't care who scores. Everybody has to score and everybody has to play defense. We all have to do our jobs."
The Flyers have won 16 games in a row and have not been beaten this season by a Division III team. Courtesy of an additional year of eligibility due to Covid, sophomores Bryan Quiller, the team's leading scorer, and Zac Sledge will be playing in the national tournament for the third time. It will be the second time around for 2022 All-American Joey McMullin, Kendall Wooldridge, Alon Hanani, Jordan Coleman and Sam Stoltz. Another sophomore, LeNijel Robinson, missed the post season because of an injury.
Sophomore Jaquan Thurman, who led the team in rebounds and posted nine double-doubles this season, watched last year's tournament as a red-shirt and was impressed by the level of competition as compared to regular season games.
"Our experience from last year will help us out a lot," he said. "We're three wins from a national championship."
Plans are for the team to fly to Syracuse on Monday. Ricky Hill will meet the team at the airport with the bus carrying all of the equipment and take them to the hotel in Utica about 55 miles away.
In addition to the national titles in 2012 and 2020, this will be Apple's seventh trip to the national tournament in his 12 years as the head coach.
"I was obviously very appreciative of being selected the No. 1 seed in the tournament," he said. "The biggest thing you're thankful for is that you only have to win three in three days instead of four in four days."
In addition to a corp of players with national tournament experience, he likes what the alums of the 2012 title team bring to the table as assistant coaches. Philip Olbon is also a member of the coaching staff.
"Your players have to be willing to take advice, take coaching and when you've got guys that have been there and done that, especially guys that aren't that far apart age-wise, I think it's an easier conversation sometimes.
"Daquan has been invaluable as far as his wisdom and advice and the experiences he's had, as have Markell and Tramaine. We feel good about what we've got going forward."
Towns sees some similarities between the 2012 team and the current one.
"The likeness is the versatility of a lot of the players and how deep we are," he said. "We're 13 or 14 deep the same as that team. Teams can't focus on one thing."
C. Bergmann