Heidelberg's Chris Cuthbert, right, and Eugene Jones show their fans Lion pride after defeating Ramstein, 73-51, in the Division I title game at the DODDS Europe basketball championships in Mannheim, on Saturday night. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
Heidelberg's Chris Cuthbert, right, and Eugene Jones show their fans Lion pride after defeating Ramstein, 73-51, in the Division I title game at the DODDS Europe basketball championships in Mannheim, on Saturday night. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
Heidelberg's Chase Boone gets past the defense of Ramstein's DeVonte Allen, left, and Samuel Wetleson to score in the Lions' 73-51 win over Ramstein in the Division I title game. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
Ramstein's James Cho takes on the defense of Heidelberg brothers Maurice, left, and Marcel Simon in the Division I title game. Heidelberg beat Ramstein, 73-51, to capture the crown. (Michael Abrams/Stars and Stripes)
MANNHEIM, Germany – Point guard Stirling Thomas scored 19 points Saturday to help the Heidelberg Lions to a dominating 73-51 victory over the two-time defending champion Ramstein Royals in the 2011 European Division I championship game.
Playing Ramstein for the fifth straight time in the D-I finale, Heidelberg opened with a 17-7 run and never looked back. Ramstein, which had won the previous two showdowns against its archrival by two points in 2010 and six points the previous year, was hardly in the game on Saturday.
Much of the difference came from Heidelberg’s power underneath the basket. The Lions out-rebounded Ramstein by an order of magnitude approaching two-to-one.
“That was a big point for us coming into the game,” said Heidelberg’s Chris Cuthbert, who scored 13 points. “Ramstein plays great post basketball, and we wanted to make sure we boxed them out.”
Heidelberg, which defeated Ramstein for the 2007 and 2008 titles, won the European crown for the seventh time since 2000 and the 18th time in the 61-year history of this event.
It was the first title at Heidelberg for Lions’ coach and athletic director Ron Merriwether, who took the reins when the school decided to replace longtime coach Brad Shahan last fall.
It wasn’t Merriwether’s first DODDS-Europe title, however. As a player, he performed on an all-comers European championship team at Giessen in 1994, and coached his alma mater to European Division III titles in 2006-2007.
Ramstein, coached by another former DODDS-Europe player, Andrew O’Connor, had difficulty penetrating against the Lions’ defense and relied heavily on the three-ball. DeVonte Allen, who tied Thomas for game-scoring honors with 19 points, canned four of them, three of them in the final stanza with the game out of reach. Jarrod Henry scored all 15 of his points on treys, and All-Europe guard Thomas Amrine sank two en route to his 10 points.
Clutching his all-tourney team plaque, Cuthbert, who missed last year’s season with a football injury, savored the moment at game’s end.
“It’s definitely a great feeling,” he said. “This team is like a family.”
if(typeof(dstb)!= "undefined"){ dstb();}
if(typeof(dstb)!= "undefined"){ dstb();}
