High 5: North Lake Captures NJCAA-Record Fifth National Championship

NJCAA DIII TOURNAMENT AWARDS

NJCAA DIII TOURNAMENT RECAP

NJCAA CHAMPIONSHIP HISTORY

NJCAA RECORD BOOK

HERKIMER, N.Y. – High 5.

Dallas College North Lake men's basketball team beat host Herkimer College, 74-61, to win the National Junior College Athletic Association Division III National Championship Saturday.

It is the fifth national title in program history – the most at any of the three NJCAA levels.

"You can't have five without four," North Lake second-year head coach Josh Mills said.

The Blazers have won two of the last three championships. They also captured the title in 2006, 2008, 2017 and 2022 under erstwhile coach Tim McGraw. This is the first championship for Mills as a head coach.

"Coach McGraw taught me how to win here, and I followed his blueprint," Mills said. "Credit to Coach McGraw for the foundation he laid for us to just continue it. Hopefully this isn't our last."

The No. 1-ranked Blazers (29-4) won 23 straight games to end the season. They went 15-0 against NJCAA Division III opponents this season. North Lake went 8-4 against NJCAA Division I and II opponents.

Sophomore guard Bryson Smith finished with 24 points, nine rebounds and six assists, and sophomore shooting guard Jakob Zenon had 22 points, eight rebounds and two steals.  

North Lake, which shot 50 percent, trailed 23-19 after Herkimer's Jayson McGhee hit a three-pointer at the 6:47 mark in the first half. The Blazers went on a 7-0 run, using a basket and free throw by Smith and two layups by Zenon to take a 26-23 lead. McGhee hit two more threes, his last with two seconds left on the clock, to offset buckets by freshman forward Anden Holmes and Smith as North Lake went into the break ahead, 30-29.

The Blazers were just one of nine from 3-point range in the first half, and shot 33.3 percent from the floor. The Generals (29-3) went 5 of 12 from long range, and shot 30.6 percent from the field. North Lake was 11 of 15 from the free throw line, while Herkimer was 2-for-2.

Freshman guard Autavius Hobbs canned a triple with 9:44 to play to put North Lake on top, 47-42. McGhee, who finished with 15 points, drained a 3 of his own to tie it 2:16 later. Sophomore guard Randy Woolf connected on a three and a layup to push the Blazers' lead back to six. Smith sank two free throws, and Woolf scored on a lay-in with 4:50 to play during an 11-1 run that put North Lake ahead, 58-48, and the Blazers coasted to the title.

Woolf accounted for seven points during the surge. He scored 11 of his 15 points in the second half.

"He's not a guy that does stuff that fills up the stat sheet," Mills said of Woolf. "He's like an extra coach on the court, but he steps up when he needs to. And we needed him to step up and be aggressive, and he did. That's what helped propel us, and give us that separation."

Woolf was 5 of 9 from the floor and 4-for-4 from the free throw line. Smith hit nine of 18 field goals. Zenon was 9 of 14 from the field, including 3 of 7 from three-point range.

Smith was named the Tournament Most Valuable Player. Zenon and Woolf were named to the All-Tournament Team.

"Obviously, Bryson played a great game," said Mills, who was named the Gary Cole Coach of the Tournament. "Jakob hit some big threes. Ring (Deng) was playing as well as could, being in foul trouble. It's like it's been the whole year. It's a total team effort. If somebody's down, somebody else steps up."

Hobbs scored nine points. Herkimer's Oladele Oladitan had 11 points and 11 rebounds. Nick Boyce had 11 points, 10 rebounds, five assists and four steals. Brandon Harris had 10 points, five assists and two steals.

The Blazers held the Generals to 29.4 percent shooting (10 of 34) in the second half. Conversely, North Lake shot 66.7 percent after the intermission, going 18 of 27.

North Lake outscored Herkimer, 44-22, in the paint. The Generals had a 17-0 advantage in second chance points.

"Really proud of this group of guys," Mills said. "It's been a really fun season. We accomplished things that aren't really supposed to happen … beating those eight scholarship schools. Going undefeated in conference is a true testament to how tough they are. This is one of the toughest teams that I've ever been able to be on. The game against Brookdale itself just shows how resilient they are. They weren't going to take no for an answer. They weren't going to back down. They weren't going to lose. We kind of felt like it was our championship to lose. We weren't going to let that slip through our fingers.

"I want to win, and I want guys that want to be here that want to win, and we definitely had that. I'm really happy that these guys got to experience winning a national championship."