Pines Charter outlasts Fleming Island to win second state title in three seasons
Robert Guishard was spent.
And he wasn’t shy about telling people he had laid it all out on the floor one last time in his high school career.
“My last game. It was just willpower,” Guishard said. “It took all that was in me. I’m done.”
That feeling applied to Guishard and his teammates on the Pembroke Pines Charter boys’ basketball team.
They might have been tired on the inside. But they were all smiles on the outside.
Moments earlier, the Jaguars put together a gritty and exhausting effort that secured them the Class 5A state championship after outlasting Fleming Island, 52-48, at UNF Arena on Friday night.
“This is amazing, it’s invigorating,” said Pines Charter coach Dave Roca, who has been at the helm of the Jaguars’ rise to prominence in recent years. “I can’t thank my assistant coaches and my players enough.”
In front of a predominantly Fleming Island crowd, which gave the game the feel of a road contest for Pines Charter, Guishard paced the effort with a dominant double-double, finishing with 19 points and 21 rebounds.
It helped the Jaguars (22-6) secure their second state championship in three seasons and third since 2021.
“I just did my job and did it to the fullest,” said Guishard, who joined the team last season, but couldn’t experience the feeling of being a state champion after Pines Charter lost in the regional final to eventual champion, Blanche Ely.
“It was the last game of my career. We just had to be physical.”
If it hadn’t already, the victory cemented the Jaguars as one of the state’s most consistent powerhouses from South Florida. Pines Charter now has three state titles in a six-year span and has made it to at least the regional final round seven consecutive seasons.
“It’s relentless. My staff is in (the gym) teaching. We’re educators. It culminates at the end of the year,” Roca said. “These guys play a lot of travel basketball and sometimes we have to break a lot of bad habits. We have to teach and re-teach again. But they have a relentlessness to win and they hate to lose and we talk about that to them all the time so they understand losing is not an option.”
In a game that was part track meet and part physical grind against the Golden Eagles (23-9), who were making their first appearance in a state final, it took more than just Guishard’s gutsy efforts at both ends of the floor to get it done.
Neither team led by more than eight points.
Junior guard Zacuras Dawson barely missed a double-double of his own with 12 points and nine rebounds. He also had a game-high three steals.
Pines Charter shot only 31%, but its defense limited a Fleming Island squad, which had nailed eight triples in its semifinal win over Tampa Jesuit to only 2 for 9 shooting from long distance and 16 for 45 (35.6%) overall.
“They’re big, long and athletic and we knew we had to stop them in the transition game,” Roca said. “My guys tensed up a bit and weren’t running our offense the way we like to do. But we knew it would be a grind out game that would come down to rebounding and stops. We watched a lot of film to know that their 3-point shooting wasn’t going to be consistent.”
Anthony Walcott, who scored 17 points in Pines Charter’s semifinal win over Lecanto on Wednesday, finished with eight points and three rebounds, after some shooting struggles (3 for 14). Walcott lost his dribble and the turnover led to a Bryce Robinson layup with 34.9 seconds left in the game that cut Pines Charter’s lead to 48-47. Walcott, however, made up for it at the foul line, hitting two big free throws with 23 seconds left.
Robinson missed a mid-range shot at the other end and Walcott came up with the clutch rebound, and got the ball ahead to junior guard Alex Vardakis, who was fouled with 9.6 left. Vardakis, who finished with 11 points, hit one of two free throws.
After Fleming Island’s Ayden Greenidge was fouled with 5.1 seconds left, he hit one of two free throws to cut the deficit to 51-48.
But Guishard grabbed the ensuing inbounds pass and was fouled. He proceeded to hit one of two and make it a two-score game again and effectively seal the outcome.
“(Robert)’s been doing this all season long,” Roca said. “He changes plays at the basket. He doesn’t give up on plays. He had three fouls at halftime and he finished the game with only three fouls. He knows how to play with a good pace and a good rhythm.”
Guishard added: “It feels incredible. We’re a family here. Our coaches are great coaches. They’ve done this for a long time and they prepare us.”
