Old favorite claims new title in over-30 championship

  • Published
  • By Samuel King Jr.
  • Team Eglin Public Affairs
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  The over-30 intramural basketball season ended March 10 at the fitness center, and a new champion was crowned.

The once-powerful Air Armament Center dynasty reclaimed the top spot after a two-year absence, and they did it as the underdog, defeating the top-ranked 96th Logistics Readiness Squadron, 50-39.

AAC came into the single-elimination tournament ranked seventh with a season record of 5-4. But AAC's reputation preceded them. AAC had been a perennial favorite and had won the championship six straight times, but had not held the trophy in the last two years.

"We didn't like losing the last two years," said Kent Watson, AAC team coach. "During our six-year run, we were always the favorites so we just took this as a different challenge."

The LRS team was the number one seed with the season record of 9-1.

"We felt we weren't the seventh seed," said Coach Watson. "If we just tweaked a couple things on offense and got back to our man-man defense, we had as good a chance as any other team to win it."

The AAC team won their playoff games easily over the second-ranked 96th Civil Engineer team and third-ranked 46th Range team by 16 and 26 points consecutively.

"We had a game plan going in to the playoffs," Watson said. "1 - Scrap the zone defense and get back to man to man. 2 - be patient on offense, look down low and kick to the open man. 3 - wear out the other teams' bigs and then run when the fast break was there."

The LRS team struggled against the fourth-seeded 46th Test Wing team, only winning by two (45-43), after getting a bye in the first round via a
forfeit.

"LRS was on the other side of the bracket and they were the only team to beat us pretty handily during the season, so if we made it to the championship that is who we wanted to play," Watson said.

The coach led his team with 10 points securing the victory 50-39, while Keri Bowers carried the LRS team with 21 points.

"The majority of us have been playing basketball together for 10-plus years now," Watson said. "We enjoy it. There is no yelling and screaming at each other like some other teams you might see. We just keep playing together because we have a good time, everybody knows their role on the team, everybody accepts it, and we bring a little "old school" team-ball back. At the end of each year in "over-30" we just add another brace and get ready for the next season."

This season proved to be a long one beginning in October, but was delayed due to floor resurfacing.

AAC team: Kent Watson, Cleo Gooden, Ryan Cochran, Gregg Thomas, Rich Hyde, John Odum, John Feagin, Tony English, Dee Dubose, Tracy Woodard, Keith Chisolm, Jake Chisolm, Rich Archer, Charles Sansbury.