Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Johnny G's Subshack makes it a double

Repeat Outlaw League winners 68-48 over Jivaro


Mixing all the right ingredients, Johnny G's Subshack whipped up a delicious sandwich of back-to-back championships Sunday in the final game of the 2006 Sutton & Sons Men's Basketball League campaign.

Led by Jeff Monroe's 25 points, top-seeded Johnny G's Subshack exploded in the second half for a 68-48 triumph over #3-seeded Jivaro Headhunters in the championship game of the 10-team double elimination tourney in Hailey.

Monroe averaged 30.0 ppg in Johnny G's Subshack final two games, which were 15-point and 20-point wins over Jivaro Headhunters.

And Johnny G's Subshack (15-1, 31-1 two seasons) finished its season with 13 consecutive wins including four victories in the tournament. Not surprisingly Johnny G's led the league in scoring (69.2 ppg) and was second best on defense (53.3 ppg).

There was no need for a second game Sunday at The Community Campus gym, although it looked like Jivaro might make a run early on.

The normally accurate outside shooting of Monroe (14 points including 6-for-7 charities) was a little off in the first half, but the sharpshooter drilled three 3-pointers in the first five minutes of the second half as Johnny G's stretched its 33-31 half-time lead to 44-35.

Monroe's outburst of triples took the wind out of Jivaro's sails, and the Headhunters (10-5-2 overall, 24-9-2 two seasons) only got as close as five points the rest of the way.

It's only fair to say that Johnny G's Subshack (15-1, 31-1 two seasons) wasn't quite the same team that played as Phoenix Bar &

Grill and beat Jivaro 72-58 in last year's final game. In fact, five of Johnny G's players were brand new.

But the champions had a fine supporting cast around their two franchise stars—2004 Division III All-American Monroe (from Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia) and Pat Loftus of Muhlenberg College.

They played together well and raced past Jivaro because they rebounded as a team and found the open man. "We're pretty unselfish. We wanted to see everybody do as well as they could," said Johnny G's Nate Scott, who played a little college ball for Central College in Iowa.

Scott (8 points, 10 rebounds, 3 blocked shots) was a major force in the paint. Johnny G's ended up out-rebounding Jivaro 41-37.

The boardwork of Scott, as well as the rebounding of Jordan Dale (8 points, 7 rebounds) helped steady the Johnny G's ship in the first half when Jivaro Headhunters threatened to pull away behind the scoring of Darrell Tullis (10 points, 8 boards) and Dan Willett (7 points, 4 rebounds).

Right after intermission, Johnny G's point guard Loftus (8 points, 7 rebounds, 5 assists) started looking for and finding Monroe on the perimeter. Monroe burned the strings twice for triples, and took a pass from Scott for one more to finish an 11-4 Johnny G's run for a 44-34 lead.

It was pretty much all over except the celebrating when Loftus came on strong with all 8 of his points and 6 boards in the second half alone. Johnny G's shot 13-for-16 from the line and Jivaro was 6-for-11 there.

"We were a little rusty in the beginning, but we came together well in the second half," Scott said.

Others in the balanced Johnny G's attack were Riley O'Grady (13 points, 6 boards, 2 steals); Garrett Conway (6 points, 3 rebounds); and Dan Rafferty (1 board, 1 assist). Unfortunately, Tony St. George, a member of last year's title team, injured his shoulder and had to leave the game for Johnny G's Subshack.

For Jivaro, Mike Payne (8 points, 7 rebounds, 3 steals) had a cold shooting game, many times guarded by Loftus. Others were Erik Lisk (8 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists); Jay Fry (5 points, 7 boards, 3 steals); Mike Schlatter (5 points, 4 rebounds); and Ron Harrison (5 points, 3 boards).

Thursday night, Jivaro Headhunters eliminated #2-seeded Soundwave/Sawtooth Paint (13-3-1) by a 65-54 score. Payne scored 19 points for Jivaro and Dave Morgan led Soundwave with 14 points.

It looked like Soundwave's game since they maintained a lead for three-quarters of the game and had a manpower advantage over Jivaro, playing with only five by the end. But the Headhunters started hitting from the perimeter and built a six-point lead with five minutes left, and Soundwave just couldn't recover.

Payne tallied 11 of his 19 points in the second half and Willett added 8 of his 12 after intermission for Jivaro. Lisk chipped in with 15 points before leaving with an ankle injury. Tullis (three 3s) tossed in 13, Harrison 6 and Schlatter 2 for Jivaro.

Scoring for Soundwave were Morgan 14, Sean Johnson 9, Jeff Burrell (three 3s) 9, Nate Thornton 5, Bryan Burrell 5, Josh Shetler 4, Luke Macdonald 4, Mike Malko 2 and Matt Marks 2.




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