The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

Coach Dudley Seide said he was so eager to bring his Reach Out Ministries teams to Nassau to compete in the 20th annual Peace on da Streets Basketball Tournament that he had them selling water on the side of the road in Grand Bahama. Their efforts paid off over the weekend as they will return home as double champions in the 13-and-under and 16-and-under divisions.

Reach Out Ministries joined the Providence Club KJ Ballers, Temple Fellowship and Mason’s Addition, who were the other champions crowned on the final day of competition Saturday at the Kendal Isaacs Gymnasium.

The curtains came down on the four-day tournament with the Pastors outlasting the Politicians in their annual exhibition match and there was more post-tournament fireworks as Able Joseph picked up the three-point shooting title before he relinquished the slam dunk title that he held for the past two years.

The ‘Worm’ out of Florida regained the title he last held before Joseph won it. The ‘Worm’ beat out ‘Jasper’ out of St Louis for the title. Bahamian rising star ‘Jordan’ was third. Joseph didn’t make it to the final.

• Here’s a summary of the divisional finales played on Saturday:

Reach Out Ministries 38, Providence Ballers 34

It took double overtime as the Grand Bahama defending champions prevailed again. The game was tied 21-21 at the end of regulation and 28-28 after the first overtime. 

Devon Seide led the attack for the visitors with 14 points, including a clutch basket in the last overtime to preserve the win in the 13-and-under division. Tremaine Ferguson had eight and both Cameron Delancey and Shamar Pinder had four. For the Providence Ballers, Garvin Clarke came through with a game high 16 points and Lavardo Dean added nine, but it wasn’t enough.

“People doubt my programme. But tonight is a testament of my programme,” said coach Dudley Seide. “I brought the inner city kids, who people wanted to give up on, under-sized, under-matched and win the championship in Nassau. It means a lot. Those boys played with a heart of a champion.”

Reach Out Ministries 22, PJ Building Supplies 21

In another game that went right down to the wire, Levante Parker came up with a game high 21 points, including seven in the second half as they bounced back from an 11-5 deficit at the half in this 16-and-under game. Mataes King was Grand Bahama’s next scorer with five. 

Nardo Bridgewater paced the losers with seven. 

“Unbelievable. We had to sell water to get here,” coach Seide said. “We had to sell water to bring these boys here to Nassau because the sponsorship wasn’t there. That’s why when people saw me jumping, they don’t know the story. I had to fight hard to get the boys here. When everybody turned their backs on us, we fought hard to get here. I can’t express how I feel. This is one of the best performances we ever had because the tournament was tough this year.”

KJ Ballers 39, Young Kings 36

Making their debut in the tournament, Providence Club made sure that the 19-and-under championship crown would not slip out of their reach as it did with their 13-and-under team. The Ballers rode the 17 points from Shakwon Lewis in a battle of two young talented guards as Lerecus Armbrister matched his output in a losing effort.

For most of the game, the fans got to see the two players go right at each other, almost duplicating one big play after the other.

“We came out of the blocks pretty good and we controlled the tempo of the game,” said Ballers’ head coach Kevin ‘KJ’ Johnson. “They came back on us and hit some big shots to make it interesting. Hats off to them, but we wanted it a little more. This was our first time in the tournament and we had two teams in the final and one in the semi-final, so we are proud of our performance and of the kids.”

Temple Fellowship 28, Cousin McPhee 24

It wasn’t a walk in and out the gym either for the Church Division as Temple Fellowship picked up another title. This time, Trevone Grant sparked their rally by scoring a game high 11 points. Basil Deveaux had six and Gabbie Laurent added four. 

After falling behind 13-11 at the half, Cousin McPhee tried to keep it close as they got eight from Randy Williams and six from Georgio Walkes.

“It was a great win,” said Temple Fellowship coach Geno Campbell as they celebrated their fourth out of six victories. “Those guys got three of my players and they talking about winning it this year but it didn’t bother me. I gave it all to God. To God be the glory. I give it all to God.”

Mason Addition 40, Berzerkers 28

This was one of those match-ups that you had to see to believe. The youthful Mason Additions stunned the more experienced Berzerkers, made up of a number of players home from school and the professional ranks. The Berzerkers, however, made it look so easy as they took an early 5-0 lead in the first quarter and never looked back, avenging their loss in last year’s final.

Mason’s Addition went on to post a slim 7-5 lead at the end of the first, but opened up an impressive 20-8 advantage. They continued to apply the pressure and was able to stay ahead 28-16 at the end of the third. But in the fourth, the Berzerkers, made their final push to get back into the game only to watch as Scott Farrington got a technical foul and was not allowed to return. On the next play, Eugene Bain got a dunk for the Berzerkers to trim the lead to 32-25, but Mason Addition went on an 8-3 spurt the rest of the way to seal the deal.

Edward Elliott led the way with a game high 12, Able Joseph had 20, Roosevelt ‘Chicken’ Whylly nine and Christoff Stuart five. For the Berzerkers, Tehran Cox scored eight and both Eugene and Michael Bain had seven. 

“The performance of the team was very great,” said coach James Johnson. “We played against a team that was filled with players from the national level, but I just told my guys to stay focused and play hard. I wasn’t surprised at all. I knew we could beat them. They won the tournament about four years straight, so I told them that we had to stop them and we did it.”

Pastors 49, Politicians 43

Shanendoah Cartwright showed that he still has some of the athletics prowess that he displayed during his high school days at St Augustine’s College. However, he combined with another alumni, Khaalis Rolle, as their efforts for the Politicians wasn’t enough to outshine the performances of Apostle Carlos Reid and Prophet Arthur Duncombe.

Reid and Duncombe, along with Pastor Delton Fernander, helped to power the Pastors to a repeat victory.

Reid, the tournament organiser, got off to a late start offensively, but by the end of the game, he had a side high 13 points to his ledger. Duncombe, who benefitted from a couple of crowd pleasing passes from Reid, finished with 12 for the Pastors, who were coached by Dudley Seide.

Cartwright, who is expected to step into the front line for the next general election, dazzled the crowd with his game high 16 points for the Politicians, coached by House Speaker Dr Kendal Major. Cartwright was followed by Khaalis Rolle with 15. 

The game started out fairly evenly matched with Cartwright canning a three-pointer just before the first buzzer to end the first quarter with the Politicians up 16-15. He picked up where he left off to start the second with another three-pointer to push their lead to 19-15.

But before they could celebrate, Reid finally found his shooting range, canning a three-pointer and dished out two consecutive passes to Duncombe to put the Pastors up 27-24 as they stayed ahead at the half time break. The Politicians fought back from a nine-point deficit, 37-28, to come within five, 37-32 at the end of the third quarter, thanks to back-to-back baskets from Renardo Curry and Celi Moss.

Once again Reid sparked the final surge in the fourth quarter on a jumper, followed by passes to Duncombe and Pastor Ivan Rolle leaving the Politicians lagging behind as they trailed 49-38 with time running out.

Reid, who doubled as the tournament director, said for their 20th anniversary, they couldn’t ask for a much better tournament.

“I think we saw some new talent emerge throughout the tournament,” Reid said. “In the open division, we saw where a team that has dominated for years was beaten by a new breed of ball players who came forth. We saw some talent that I’m not familiar with so it means we can’t take sports lightly.

“I also want to commend the team coming from Freeport. They won two divisions, so I was impressed. I saw a promising future for basketball in this nation. Even in the Pastors/Politicians game, it wasn’t just a laugh or a spectacle. For the first time it was really competitive. We saw some talent in this area. The slam dunk and three-point contest also went to another level.”