The Sudbury Five will travel to southwestern Ontario this week, intent on regaining home court advantage in their best of five Basketball Super League final with the Windsor Express.
Best case: they sweep a pair of games on the road and claim their first ever championship title.
Worst case: they have to return home for game five tied at 2-2 next Tuesday in Sudbury.
Failure to regain home court means their season will be over, dropping the set to Windsor three games to one after the Express earned a split this past weekend in northern Ontario.
The visitors played the Five tough, from start to finish, forcing the regular season champs to overtime before Sudbury finally prevailed, 103-100 in game one last Thursday.
Stretched to a 42-minute encounter, J.D. Miller was the big story for the Five, netting 27 points and hauling in 14 rebounds, twice the total of the second best rebounder of the hight.
Behind the grizzled veteran was a diversified Sudbury attack as Duane Notice (18), Diego Bernard (13), Jelani Simmons (11) and Jermaine Haley (10) all hit for double digits.
The Express, who trailed 25-19 (Q1), 53-48 (Q2) and 78-71 (Q3) before rallying to outscore Sudbury 21-14 in the final twelve also shared the ball nicely, as seen in their scoring leader parade: Latin Davis (20), Jaire Grayer (19), Markus Golder (19), Zavier Turner (17), Lydell Elmore (12) and Vincent Boumann (12).
For a second straight game, Sudbury struggled mightily in the fourth quarter and in game two of the series, this would prove costly as Windsor racked up a 104-87 win largely on the strength of an impressive fourth quarter performance (27-13).
Held in check in game one, Mike Bruce broke through to lead the Express with 20 points, followed by Latin Davis (19), Lydell Elmore (17), Jaire Grayer (16), Cameron Gaines (13) and Zavier Turner (13).
J.D. Miller once again was impressive, even given a far more managed 25-minute game (with 25 points), with Jelani Simmons adding 21 points. Beyond that, only Allen Billinger (11) hit double digits as Sudbury had trouble matching Windsor rebound for rebound, losing that statistical battle 40-27.
The series resumes Wednesday in Windsor, with game four set for Friday, April 25th, also in Windsor.
