The Old Barn on Elgin Street was more than due for a big celebration.

On Tuesday night, the Sudbury Five delivered.

Force to game five by a tenacious Windsor Express unit, the regular season champs from northern Ontario unveiled one of their most complete efforts of the entire season, taking the deciding match by a final score of 103-91.

Building off an unbelievably good start - Sudbury led 32-13 at the end of the first quarter of play - the Five maintained the highest level of defensive intensity that they displayed all year, seldom allowing the Express to cut the deficit beyond eight to ten points or so.

"We wanted to control the game," acknowledged Sudbury head coach Logan Stutz. "We had little letdowns here and there but for the most part, the guys showed up."

Playoff MVP J.D. Miller enjoyed a monster game, racking up 32 points after spending 47 minutes on the floor and finishing second only to Stephen Hurt in the rebounds department (11 vs 8).

Every time that Windsor inched closer, the Five had a response.

More often than not, it was via a three-point dagger from Diego Bernard, Duane Notice, Jelani Simmons, Allen Billinger or Charlie Marquardt.

At other times, they would simply pound the ball inside, capitalizing on the mismatch that Miller created. Either way, they maintained their composure in ensuring that the early lead would not be allowed to slip away.

"We knew that we had to stay level," said coach Stutz. "We talked about that in Windsor. Our highs were too high and our lows were too low. We wanted to keep it at a certain level and tonight, it never got away from us."

Still quite early in his coaching career, Stutz pushed all the right buttons on this night - and perhaps even in the days preceding the big game.

"I gave the guys some rest," he said. "They knew the other team well. We had a great scout from (assistant coach) Denis Gauthier, so we decided to rest them with a few less reps in practice."

"We were confident they knew what they were doing tonight."

Statistically speaking, Windsor held few, if any advantages, led in scoring by the likes of Markus Golder (22 points - and the first seven points for his team), as well as Latin Davis and big man Vincent Boumann (18 points each).

Jaire Grayer (14) and Cameron Gaines (11) also hit double digits, but Sudbury was far more efficient from beyond the arc (14/27 - 51.9% vs 9/27 - 33.3%) as well as from the free throw line (17/20 - 85% vs 12/18 - 66.6%).

"We actually put in kind of a new offense with no live reps and it worked out pretty well for us," said Stutz, who saw his team up by 15 at the half (52-37) and by 16 heading to quarter four (79-63).

"We had to get off the scoring drought from Windsor," Stutz added. "We got our bigs involved (Hurt was huge inside the paint in 15 minutes of playing time) and to the rim, and we got people to the right places and they executed really well."

Logan Stutz does little to conceal just how much he has enjoyed his time in Sudbury, a sentiment that is sure to grow now that he and the 2024-2025 team have made history as the first since the franchise inception to claim a league crown.

"This is for Sudbury," Stutz exclaimed, amid the post-game court chaos on Tuesday. "I told the guys: you're here for six months, but you have a chance to give these people something they will remember for the rest of their lives."

And a crowd of 2638 on hand at the Old Barn, for the festivities, were more than a little thankful for that.