Beecher defeats Traverse City St Francis 74-60 to win Class A title
The Beecher Bucs are the Class C state champions. They posed with their hardware on Saturday at the Breslin Center.
/ Earl Arms
EAST LANSING -- The last time the Beecher Bucs won a state title it was 1987.
The past two teams gave it a run, but this 2011-2012 squad finally pulled it off, plus a perfect 28-0 season is just icing on the cake.
Monte Morris was a freshman and sophomore the last time the two teams made it to the Breslin Center and lost.
This year, would be a different story.
Beecher jumped out of the gate immediately and built a 23-9 lead after one quarter.
Morris hit a lay-up at the buzzer going into the half as the Bucs led by 20. He ended the game with a team-leading 18 points.
St Francis got within 12, but Beecher pulled away in the second half. Antuan Burks had 16 points, six rebounds, and six assists.
The Bucs never trailed and they win it 74-60 to become the 2012 Class C State Champions.
"It's humbling to be considered to be now right up there with all of those great teams that have played in the past at Beecher," Head Coach Mike Williams said. "To add to the legacy, that's the main thing."
"I've been dreaming about this since middle school," Senior Antuan Burks said. "Seeing Coach Williams get to the state championship in 2008 and not finish it. Me and Monte [Morris} sat right here and said we're going to get back. We're going to bring a championship home, and that's what we did today."
"We just stayed hungry all year, hungry and humble," Morris said "Just the fact that we knew we could get back, we didn't know we would be 28-0, we just knew we could get here. We just wanted to make it become a reality.
