Westminster Academy boys’ basketball completes three-peat with state-title thriller
Every time Ehren Wallhoff would get emotional talking about his latest iteration of the Westminster Academy boys’ basketball team, he found himself repeating a little ritual. With a massive state championship ring cuffing his right ring finger, the coach would clench his hand into a fist and knock it on the press-conference table a few times.
He did it a couple times Wednesday after the Lions’ win in the Class 4A semifinals, then he did it once on Thursday. A few minutes after Westminster’s 77-73 win against Seffner Christian in the 4A championship, Wallhoff thought back upon the past four seasons, which yielded four straight trips to the state championship game and now three straight state titles.
“A couple of them have been around it for four or five years. It was important for them to go out right,” Wallhoff said. “I know they work so hard and see what they’ve been able to accomplish. I wanted them to finish right.”
Completing the three-peat was no easy feat. The Lions dug a hole in the first quarter at the RP Funding Center, trailed at halftime, then fought through a back-and-forth third quarter before outlasting the Crusaders in the fourth quarter.
Westminster (26-5) used its same formula with the Lions’ senior backcourt shouldering the offensive burden. Star point guard Sam Griffin, who has signed with the UT Arlington Mavericks, scored a team-high 24 and star guard Chase Johnston, who has signed with the Purdue Fort Wayne Mastodons, added 19 to put Westminster in exclusive company. The Lions join Dillard, which won four straight state championships from 2000-2003, as the only Broward County teams to win three straight titles.
“We know the legacy that Dillard holds with that and what they were able to accomplish,” Wallhoff said. “It’s a year-round thing for us. It’s not six months or eight months. It’s 12 months and a lot of nights where we don’t see our kids, but it’s all worth it when you see these kids be successful.”
The first half in Lakeland was defined by runs from both teams. Seffner Christian (25-7) jumped out to an 11-4 lead before Westminster answered with a 16-2 spurt to take a 20-13 lead. The Crusaders closed the half on a 7-0 run to take a 32-31 lead into the break.
The opening minutes for Westminster were about survival. Griffin and Johnston combined for two points on 1-of-6 shooting in the first quarter. The Lions instead turned to a freshman.
A day after grabbing 17 rebounds and blocking eight shots in the 4A semifinals, power forward Benjamin Middlebrooks scored eight points and blocked two shots in the first quarter Thursday. The freshman finished with 18 points.
The lead changed five times in the third quarter and the period ended with the score knotted at 52.
Then Johnston broke out. As the fourth quarter began, Johnston sneaked to the left corner. Junior point guard Stephan Swenson — who finished with 15 points, seven assists, and five rebounds — found Johnston just nine seconds into the period and the senior canned a three-pointer. Johnston, who went 2 of 8 with six points in the first three quarters, unloaded for 13 in the fourth quarter, sinking three of his four threes.
In the final moments, he was the one at the free-throw line and it couldn’t have been more fitting. Johnston started playing for the Lions when he was in eighth grade and is one of only two players to play in four state championship games — Westminster lost in 2016 before winning three in a row.
With a two-point lead and two seconds left, Johnston dropped in a pair of free throws. Once again, the Lions could celebrate.
Just as Johnston planned.
“When we came here as a freshman, that feeling was horrible. Just leaving that locker room losing and we said we’re never going to do that again, so that was just motivation for all of us,” Johnston said. “Every time we came up here to know that we’re not going to leave the locker room crying because we lost, but crying because we won.”
This story was originally published March 7, 2019 at 4:32 PM.
