The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

It was another day of celebrations for the Jordan Prince Williams High School.

For the second time in history, their Falcons junior and senior boys basketball teams were crowned as the Bahamas Association of Independent Secondary Schools champions under the same coach as Ernest Saunders who matched the efforts of coach Godfrey McCoy, who guided Jordan Prince Williams to the two titles in 2007.

Minister of Youth, Sports and Culture Dr Daniel Johnson joined the Bahamas National Baptist Missionary and Educational Convention’s president Rev Dr William Thompson, executive secretary Bishop Delton Fernander and second vice president, Dr Victor Cooper, in honouring the two teams yesterday during a special assembly at the school.

Last Thursday night at the Kendal Issacs Gymnasium, the Falcons dethroned both the St Augustine’s College Big Red Machine and the Queen’s College Comets to win the junior and senior boys’ titles in grand style in two-game sweeps of their best-of-three championship series.

“We started this programme about two years ago to build this sports power among our basketball teams and this is the culmination of that,” Rev Thompson said. “We are very proud of the school, we are very proud of the athletes and we are very proud of the coaches. We are also proud of the leadership that we have placed here at Jordan Prince Williams High.

“I think it speaks well for the other young people in the country that if they get involved with something positive, whether it’s at the school level or the community level, this is the positiveness that can be derived from their efforts. We in the convention, salute our champions today.”

Dr Johnson, taking the student body in an exercise where they had 10 seconds to change the seat with someone else, said at the top of the BAISS was the Big Red Machine and the Comets, but now the Falcons are flying high. He said Jordan Prince Williams just has to “claim it and keep it.”

Eugene Bonamy, principal at Jordan Prince Williams, said the championship feat as once again pushed the Falcons sporting programme into the spotlight and they intend to enjoy their position right now.

“For a number of years we have been on the back burner, but we’ve had excellent coaching over the past few years and this is the result of their excellent coaching,” Bonamy said. “It pushes the institution to another level and we are thankful to God for the victory.”

While the school only hosted the assembly yesterday before the rain came down, Bonamy said they intend to stage a motorcade in the future. But he noted that they still have some unfinished business to take care of. There’s the prestigious Hugh Campbell Basketball Classic that is coming up this month and in March, Bonamy said they already got an invitation from the Bahamas Basketball Federation to be a part of the proposed national basketball championship to be held in Grand Bahama.

After reading the invitational letter from the BBF, Bonamy put Minister Johnson on the spot, indicating that they are asking for some financial support from the Ministry of Sports. Without any objection, Johnson said as a “good Baptist, it’s done.”

Before he looked ahead to the remaining tournaments on the calendar, coach Saunders said they want to put their performance in perspective first.

“This feels awesome. This feels awesome, I must say,” he said. “These guys put in the work, but I’ve been preaching to them over and over that hard work will pay off. We kept that in mind and we made progress and this is the result of our efforts. It feels good to be double champions.”

As for the Huge Campbell and the National Championships, Saunders said they still have quite a few things to brush up on, but by the time those events roll around, they will be ready to display that Falcon pride in getting around another title or two.

The championships didn’t come easy. Just ask senior boys’ point guard Sherman Marshall.

“All of the hard work finally paid of,” he stated. ”We had morning practices, afternoon practices, sometimes morning and afternoon practices, but they all paid off. This is a great victory for us. We have a great team and a great coach and this is a great school.”

With the “best coach and the best team,” Marshall said they are looking forward to “winning it all this year because we have God on our side.”

Veteran coach Hattie Moxey, who serves as the head of the Physical Education Department, said it was good to be at Jordan Prince Williams to celebrate another double championship feat under the same coach.

“McCoy was the first one to do it and now Mr Saunders did it this year,” Moxey said. “We’re getting accustomed to this type of celebration.”

And while they missed out on a triple celebrations with their senior girls losing out to the St Augustine’s College Big Red Machine, Moxey said they are confident that they will do it next year.

“We will do it with both girls with Mr McSweeney,” she said.

Terrance McSweeney, coach of the girls, sang the praises of the boys’ team, but noted that his girls will be making headlines next year.

“Success is not all in winning, but what you are looking at achieving,” he said. “I think with this my second year here, we have achieved a lot this year. Based on what we did last year when we lost one game, we went undefeated in winning the pennant this year, but we just didn’t get over the final hurdle.

“Our future looks bright and we’re looking forward to about 90 per cent of the girls coming back in both the junior and senior teams and we have some juniors who are moving up, so we are looking forward to doing some more offseason work on our ball handling and some of shooting skills. If we can get those things done, we can be like coach Saunders in bringing the ship home in both divisions.”

And the coach, who did it first, was the first to commend the team.

“I think it was excellent. They did what they had to do,” McCoy said. “Mr Saunders did an excellent coaching job. I’m really proud of the entire team.”

Making up the Falcons senior boys’ team are Rhandon Scott, Wilfred Ferguson, Xavier Collie, Micah Bethel, Perry Gould, David Taylor, Shakim Sweeting, Tarique Daxon, Jefferson Oliver, Adam Johnson, Frantwion Newton, Stevejay Whylly, Koy Martin and Sherman Marshall.

The junior boys comprised of Dwight Dean, Janard fisher, Elexion Morley, Dario Thompson, Justin Griffin, Deante Dean, Mateo Taylor, Aljay Stubbs, Jason Deveaux, Joseph Benior, Khobe Mackey and Darius Brown.