NORTH BETHESDA, Md. -- What tipped off the obvious was the passion, a tidal wave of emotion smashing off the walls. With index fingers pointed skyward and homemade signs fluttering, the Findlay Prep Pilots faithful gleefully christened their conquering winners Sunday afternoon.
Winners? It's time to address them properly: national champions.
That's exactly what the third-year program from Henderson, Nev., accomplished by taking down perennial powerhouse Oak Hill Academy (Mouth of Wilson, Va.), No. 1 in the ESPN RISE FAB 50 boys' basketball rankings.
The No. 2 Pilots defeated Oak Hill 74-66 in the inaugural ESPN RISE National High School Invitational championship game at Georgetown Prep's Hanley Center.
Findlay's victory cemented its place atop the final ESPN RISE rankings, which will be released Tuesday.
Sunday also was the first time the final high school game of the season pitted the consensus top two ranked teams against each other.
Michael Peck, Findlay's second-year coach, who has a 68-1 record, knew slaying Oak Hill would take a monumental effort. After all, the Warriors have been crowned national champions by the rankings services seven times in the past 24 years.
This time, the title was settled on the floor, with 1,200 screaming fans and a national television audience watching on ESPN.
"These eight [players] are the best, and I'm not trading any of them," Peck said of his small roster.
Peck also used Oak Hill's long-standing tradition as a motivational tool.
"We used it a little bit; I'm not gonna lie to you," Peck said. "[Oak Hill coach] Steve Smith has been doing that for a long time with tradition, history and success. Still, there are people who didn't believe a third-year program could do it."
Findlay Prep (33-0), a privately funded basketball academy, which calls The Henderson International School home, did it with poise and execution.
"They won it fair and square," Oak Hill guard Lamont "MoMo"Jones said. "You've got to give it to Avery [Bradley]; he played great, and so did his team."
Bradley, named the tournament's MVP, showed why he might be considered the nation's top senior. The Texas-bound guard totaled 20 points, eight rebounds and two steals before fouling out with 2:32 remaining and Findlay clinging to a 62-57 lead.
"I had 30 texts right now, and one was his mother's. I said, 'Your son is special,''' Peck said. "It's not just basketball for Avery, but we have guys that we really love.
"You want to come, we are going to make you a better student, person and player. I give credit to his mom for raising a fine young player -- how he conducts himself."
Oak Hill's 14-6 burst in the fourth tightened the game after Findlay took a 50-35 lead after three quarters.
"If [Avery] had fouled out maybe two minutes earlier, we'd have had them; he's the best guard Oak Hill has ever faced," Smith said. "We were in a big hole in the fourth quarter -- 16 points. We cut it to five; I'm proud of my team, but that's a lot of points to make up against a great team. That was a difficult hill to climb."
After Oak Hill (40-1) made it 63-58 on Jones' free throw with 1:41 left, Findlay made seven of eight free throws and junior forward Tristan Thompson (12 points, 11 rebounds) threw down a pair of crowd-pleasing dunks to close out the historic victory. Reserve guard Issiah Grayson, a senior from Atlanta, scored seven points in the fourth, spelling Bradley when he fouled out.
"[Grayson] did an unbelievable job, stepping up when we called upon him," Peck said.
Oak Hill's late run slightly altered Findlay's strategy, forcing the Pilots to temporarily spread the floor.
But each time Oak Hill made a run, Findlay never flinched.
"You never want to play not to lose, but you want to play smart. That is hard. This is one of very few groups that can do that," Peck said. "I don't want to play nervous, over my shoulder. I wanted to play very loose, comfortable and confident, but at the same time, smart."
Findlay's in-your-face defense (or "Desert Swarm") manhandled Oak Hill in the third quarter, creating havoc. The usually confident Warriors were flustered as Bradley and D.J. Richardson combined for 14 of the Pilots' 24 points. Richardson finished with 11 points on 5-of-8 shooting.
Joining Bradley on the NHSI all-tournament team were Keith "Tiny" Gallon and Jones of Oak Hill and Cory Joseph (18 points, three steals) and Richardson of Findlay.
Gallon, a McDonald's All-American who has signed with Oklahoma, had 18 points and 15 rebounds but didn't get in sync shooting. The 6-foot-9, 293-pound forward made only five of 12 shots from the floor and went 2-for-7 from beyond the arc.
"Tiny shoots over 40 percent on 3s and has made six in one game," Smith said in defense of his big man.
Findlay's 3-2 zone quickly morphed into a 2-3 at the onset of the second quarter, fueling a 14-7 tear and a 26-20 advantage at intermission.
"They are long and athletic; that's not your average high school zone," Smith said.
Peck, at the urging of his assistants, installed zone to give teams "and especially Oak Hill another defensive look."
"I think it was hard to learn it at first," said Bradley, who is from Tacoma, Wash. "All year, we have been playing man-to-man. I could kind of see Tiny was getting frustrated. If Tiny was frustrated, I thought we should stay in the zone and he would move up [closer to the basket]."
The switch allowed the Pilots to take a 19-15 lead. Jones' slicing move, extenuated with a hop-step, cut Findlay's edge to 22-20. But Findlay's Illinois-bound Richardson hit back-to-back shots to close the first-half scoring.
Gallon and Jones scored seven points apiece, but overall, Oak Hill went only 8-for-26 (28.6 percent), including an anemic 1-for-11 (9.1 percent) on 3-pointers, in the first 16 minutes.
Five players contributed to Findlay's initial scoring, topped by Bradley's seven points. Findlay was a respectable 11-for-23 (47.8 percent) from the floor.
The Warriors took a 13-12 lead after one quarter when Jones' NBA-range 3-pointer beat the buzzer. However, Findlay led for a majority of the stanza, feeding off tenacious perimeter defense. The Warriors seemed satisfied to lengthen their possessions, looking for Gallon in the post or Jones in the wings.
Oak Hill, which had its win streak halted at 46 games, received 19 points from junior guard Pe'Shon Howard, who made four of six 3-pointers, but overall shot a frigid 21-for-58 (36.2 percent).
Findlay's unsung floor general, Joseph, a junior from Toronto, was the glue down the stretch, urging his teammates and engineering the offense.
"Thank God he is a junior," Peck said. "He's got stuff you can't teach. I don't care how many hours, how much film you watch, he's the guy next year we are going to look for him in a leadership role, putting more on his shoulders -- stuff you can't teach."
Cliff Findlay, a car dealership owner from Las Vegas and UNLV basketball standout in the late 1960s, named the school after his mother, Mary Jo Findlay, and helped kick-start the program, which landed a national championship and credibility quicker than imagined.
"The best thing was to see the emotions of the coaches' wives, mothers and friends," Cliff Findlay said. "The whole thing is awesome. I never expected to win like this in three years. Realistically, you think maybe a decade. But these are eight great kids."
When Peck, a former UNLV assistant, came aboard, he established program goals. One was winning a national championship.
"That was the ultimate goal and vision," he said.
He also used Oak Hill as a model.
"That's what we want to get to; that's what we wanted to become," Peck said. "Did it happen fast enough? You always want it immediately, but it came with a lot of hard work. We filter our guys pretty closely to make sure they are the right fit.
"It is not for everybody -- we go in knowing that -- but we provide a need for a lot of kids out there."
Smith, gracious in defeat, said, "Everyone got what they wanted: one versus two. What a game."
Christopher Lawlor has covered high school sports for more than 20 years, most recently with USA Today, where he was the head preps writer responsible for national high school rankings in football, baseball, and boys' and girls' basketball. He also worked for Scholastic Coach magazine, for which he ran the Gatorade National Player of the Year program for nine years. Lawlor, a New Jersey resident, grew up in Rochester, N.Y., and is a graduate of St. Bonaventure University.