Late Rally Sends Flyers Past Falcons to Fifth Place Game
The #4 seed Sandhills Flyers completed a late second half rally over the #1 seed Dutchess Falcons Friday afternoon in the 5th place game semifinal as part of the NJCAA National Championship Division III Tournament. Trailing majority of the second half the Flyers clawed their way to a 78-77 win.
"This national tournament humbles you because you can go in with all kinds of aspirations and you never know. We should have won a ballgame last night. And we did not. And honestly, we probably should've lost one today and we did not. I was very proud of our guys; they fought hard last night and didn't win. Today they fought just as hard and came out with the win," Flyers Head coach Mike Apple said.
With the win the Flyers now advance to the fifth-place game of the tournament and will face the winner of Salem Community College and Union tomorrow at 12 p.m. As for the Falcons their season comes to an end at 26-3
Trailing 73-72 the Flyers took the lead at 74-72 thanks to a pair of free throws by Kendall Smith. The Falcons then took the lead 75-74 with a pair of free throws as well. Trailing 77-74 the Flyers got the momentum back on their side with jumper from Mylon Campbell to cut the lead down to 77-76 and then took the lead for good at 78-77 with a pair of free throws. From there the Flyers locked down the Falcons on defense and held on for the win.
"You've got to hit shots and that was the nice thing to see is our aggressiveness going to the rim late in that game. It caused us to be able to get to the free throw line a little bit and that certainly helped us," Apple said.
Sandhills got things going early with a 5-2 lead. The Falcons then flipped the game in their favor with a scoring run to take the lead at 10-7. The Flyers continued to battle with the Falcons as they trimmed down the lead with a response to every Falcons run making it 17-15 Dutchess.
Trailing 25-24 the Flyers added on to a 7-2 run to not only take the 30-29 lead but push their lead out to 35-31 as the first half was winding down. The Falcons were not backing down as they managed to tie the game back up at 35-35 and then gain the advantage at halftime taking a 38-35 lead into the locker room.
Both offenses not backing down came out the second half trading basket for basket with the Falcons holding on to their 47-44 lead. The Falcons then turned the intensity and broke open the game for the time being but not before the Flyers responded and made it a 58-52 game. A 6-0 run from DCC extended the lead to 64-52. Despite trailing by 10 as the game was winding down the Flyers continued to battle and did just that as they found themselves down 73-70 heading into those last three crucial minutes.
"I think a characteristic of our team all year is that we do not give up. We play as hard as we can play for as long as we can play. And fortunately, it came out on the good side today," Apple said.
Isaiah Upchurch led the way with 15 points, six rebounds and two assist. He came away with three steals and a block on defense. Zack Noel followed with 14 points, 11 rebounds. Smith finished with 13 points, two rebounds, two assists and a steal.
Z. Ciboth