Catching up on the Junior College tourney.

Congrats go out to Gulf Coast, FL, Division I National Champions. The Commodores returned home after their victory over Central Arizona, 62-61, to an impromptu celebration.

A crowd of about 75 ardent Gulf Coast fans was waiting with signs, and one fan led cheers with a megaphone. As bus driver Ronnie Thompson circled the driveway in front of the field house twice, livening the crowd to a yell, the team cheered and pounded on the windows inside. From her seat in the front row of the bus, head coach Ronnie Scovel smiled the whole time.

“To be able to have it here,” Scovel said. “These people are so
excited.”

Gulf Coast President James Kerley who was in Salina for the tournament, "said the Lady Commodores kept churning out gutsy efforts en route to the crown. In his first year at the school, Kerley said he was impressed with the turnout on Sunday.

“That was amazing to see,” he said. “I think they needed to hear that.”

As for the championship game, the game pitted two good friends - and two of the best D-I coaches - against each other: Florida's Scovel and Central Arizona's Lin Laursen.

The Lady Commodores battled back to win three times during the tournament heading into the finals against the top-seeded Vaqueras and needed a fourth comeback, 10-4 run late in the second half, to secure the school’s second national championship.

Flordia's Dee Liles, who last Friday was named the State Farm/Women’s Basketball Coaches’ Association junior college player of the year, was named the tournament MVP. Liles, who will attend Maryland next year, was the only junior college player invited to the U-19 USA national team tryouts last summer.

“She’s a phenomenal athlete,” Gulf Coast coach Roonie Scovel said. “Probably the top athlete in this country. She’s got a great game. She can guard the post, run the perimeter, take you outside, take you inside.”

One final note: The end of the game, which was not without some controversy, signalled the end of Lin Laursen's coaching career. Retiring after 34 seasons, Laursen has amassed a staggering 971 victories. That's 971 wins with a team that every season is made up of freshmen and sophomores.

Perhaps more impressive, though, are the 138 players she can name who’ve moved on to major universities because of the time and energy she's put in to build both the the student's academic and basketball portfolio Did you notice the JUCO player for Virginia who made the bucket-and-one to tie the game v. ODU? A Central Arizona product.

Laursen is legendary for her passion, energy and humor. People call her voice mail just to hear her latest one-liner. She is pondering the opening to her Hall of Fame induction speech in Knoxville, and it goes something like this: “I’d like to thank my shoe sponsor, Payless…”

But do not, ever, understimate the job she and her fellow JUCO colleges are called to do. Explained Laursen in a recent article:

“We’re paid to teach at this college. Coaching is a side stipend. But that’s why the coaches are here. Everybody always says, ‘Well, how many full rides do you have?’ No -- we have money and I have to divide it up. I have to be an accountant and banker. That’s why we’re perpetually having fundraisers.

Coaches come in and say, ‘What’s your per diem?’ I don’t even know what that means,” she deadpanned.

As for her players? “They get it all here – free tutoring. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday night they’re in study hall. They’ve already run this morning at 6am, and lifted. And I will see them on the floor at 3pm. And that’s the way it is.”

Of course, her team will have enormous turnover every season because, well, junior colleges are two year institutions.

“I brought back two players this year,” Laursen explained. “I have ten freshmen. We’re turning the team over 60-70% every year. Every year you’re rebuilding, reloading, re-, re- re-. But I guess that the fun and excitement of it.

People say, ‘Lin, you’ve won three national titles, you’ve been in four final fours, why do you climb the mountain?’ Well, some people will say, ‘Because it’s there.’

My answer is, ‘No, because WE’RE here. The 2007 crew is here, and it’s a whole new climb.’”

Basketball's loss is the golf course's gain.