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Bamberg's Tim Gamble drives to the basket for two points against Sigonella in the Boy's Division III championship game in Baumholder, Germany, on Saturday.

Bamberg's Tim Gamble drives to the basket for two points against Sigonella in the Boy's Division III championship game in Baumholder, Germany, on Saturday. (Raymond T. Conway / S&S)

Bamberg's Tim Gamble drives to the basket for two points against Sigonella in the Boy's Division III championship game in Baumholder, Germany, on Saturday.

Bamberg's Tim Gamble drives to the basket for two points against Sigonella in the Boy's Division III championship game in Baumholder, Germany, on Saturday. (Raymond T. Conway / S&S)

Bamberg's Brian Lawrence, center, is caught between Sigonella's Shawn Crawford, left, and Paul Nicholson as he tries to thread a pass in the Boy's Division III championship game in Baumholder, Germany, on Saturday.

Bamberg's Brian Lawrence, center, is caught between Sigonella's Shawn Crawford, left, and Paul Nicholson as he tries to thread a pass in the Boy's Division III championship game in Baumholder, Germany, on Saturday. (Raymond T. Conway / S&S)

BAUMHOLDER, Germany — As his Barons celebrated around him after beating Sigonella, Bamberg assistant coach Earnest Kellogg shouted, “If Miguel Lozada isn’t tournament MVP, then somebody made a mistake.”

Right team, wrong player.

The 2003 Division III championship tournament’s most valuable player turned out to be one of Lozada’s teammates — junior forward Jose Urbaez — after Bamberg coasted past Sigonella 61-46 Saturday night to win its second-straight title.

“A lot of these teams came in with one good player, thinking he was going to shoot us out of here,” Kellogg said. “But we brought the right 12 kids.”

It was hard to argue with Kellogg’s MVP pick, as Lozada racked up 23 points to lead all scorers. Junior Tim Gamble contributed 13 points and senior Daryl Wiley 12.

After a fairly even first half, Bamberg used its depth and size advantage to maintain a collapsing defense that drained Sigonella in the third quarter, when Bamberg broke away to a 44-34 lead.

Every time a Sigonella player touched the ball inside, Bamberg surrounded him, and Wiley and Urbaez kept harassing the Jaguars’ outside shooters.

In one surreal play, Urbaez stopped a Sigonella fast break cold by snatching away the basketball in mid-shot.

Sigonella star Roderick Perkins and Jose Peralta, tried to keep the Jaguars close by creating 12 steals, but their fatigued team failed repeatedly to convert the steals into points.

“Our two main guys, Perkins and [Terrence] Young gave everything they had getting us to this point,” Sigonella’s coach Vane McCormick said.

Young led Sigonella with 17 points, while Perkins had 15.

The final game was not a thing of beauty. Both teams had only brief bouts of fluid play as they threw errant passes, tripped, shot erratically and struggled to finish fast breaks.

As the game wore on, Bamberg became more aggressive at both ends of the court.

Kellogg said he was most impressed by his team’s relentless control of the offensive and defensive boards.

“I didn’t count ’em, but the rebounds were comin’ off by the dozens,” he said.

The closest Sigonella came in the final quarter was 53-40 with 4:27 left in the game as Perkins drove inside for an uncontested layup. But with Gamble deftly dealing him the ball, Nik Krauchi floated in for a layup at the 2:32 mark to build Bamberg’s lead to 17 points.

Bamberg coach Charles Jordan dedicated the repeat championship to Travis Martin, the former Bamberg player who died last year at 18 after complications from knee surgery.

“For us, it’s been about Travis Martin all season,” Jordan said. “There’s something we do every game called ‘22 seconds of prayer’ [for West’s number 22], and that’s for him,” the coach said.

Jordan said the team will send an autographed basketball to Martin’s mother in Fort Jackson, S.C.

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