With the semi-finals out of the way, the stage is set for the big finale to the San Diego Hoops basketball season. In the championship game it will be Morgan Stanley facing the surging Moby Dick’s team, and in the consolation game for third place it will be Powerhouse Gym up against Numbers.

In the first game of the night it was Moby Dick’s against Powerhouse Gym. Five weeks into the season, Moby Dick’s sat in last place in the league but the mid-season addition of Dustin Mears played a key role in the team’s turnaround this season.

“In all honesty, if it wasn’t for the guys who couldn’t finish this season we wouldn’t have gotten Dustin, which made a big difference,” Moby’s coach David Valenzuela admitted. “It took a little while; the second half of the season when we finally all got together, there were a lot of hot tempers there and we finally gelled after that second loss to Lips.”

In the first half of the game Moby’s kept the ball moving fast up and down the court to amass a 36-25 lead. Powerhouse countered in the second half, putting a full court press on Moby’s to slow them down. While Powerhouse was able to pull within six points of Moby’s, in the final minutes of the game they took to fouling Moby’s to keep them from running out the clock. However, the strategy did not work, as Moby’s continued to sink the free throws and maintain their lead, finally winning by a score of 73-61.

“It was just our same old run and gun,” Valenzuela said. “Get the ball to our forwards and the rest of the team contributed. We all did our little parts, but the big two did most of the damage. Without those two making us better it wouldn’t be the same team.”

Dwight Dunn led Moby’s with a season high of 40 points and was assisted by Dustin Mears, who was double-teamed for most of the game, with 19 points. Robert Wiggins led Powerhouse Gym with 21.

“We had a good season, we just got beat by a better team tonight,” Powerhouse coach Brandon Culley said about the loss. “Dwight was on, so was Dustin. It’s just hard to beat them.”

Reflecting on the season he added, “We all played together and we played well. We were number one for most of the season and at the end we got beat a couple of times. It was a good overall season and we are proud of it.”

The second game of the night pitted number one seed Morgan Stanley against number five Numbers. Morgan Stanley spent most of the season on Powerhouse’s heels in second place, before moving into a tie and eventually beating them in the final week of league play to take sole possession of first place. Numbers started off the season going 4-4 and then hit a rough spot, losing five in a row. They bounced back stronger than ever, winning their final five games of the season.

In last Wednesday’s game, Morgan Stanley put a full court press on Numbers early on and slowly increased their lead to 29-20 at the half, with the last point thanks to a technical called against Numbers.

Thirteen minutes into the second half Numbers began to make their move, narrowing the Morgan Stanley lead to 34-31.

“They switched up their defense, they went to a box and chaser and they had a nice little run,” Morgan Stanley coach Paul Demke said. “Good teams are always going to have a nice run, so we expected that and we just kept our composure and did a nice job in the last few minutes executing and had nice shot selection.”

Stanley called a time out to adjust to the new Numbers offense and came out swinging as they began to punch through the Numbers defense and increase their lead until time expired with the score at 49-38.

“They have the two key players so we were going to try to contain, not stop, Stuart and Greg,” Demke said about the strategy going into the game. “I feel we did a really nice job on both of them, and they only scored 38 points, so our game plan obviously worked.”

Despite the 11-point deficit, Numbers proved that they came out playing to win. Greg Torrence led them with 18 points while Demke led Morgan Stanley’s scoring with 25. In the end, Demke’s versatility as a player and his three-point shooting skills proved to be the difference. Whenever Numbers guarded him on the outside it left an opening in the lanes for Chris McBride and Jeremy Oslowsky.

“We played our best game all year against Morgan Stanley, so it was a good showing and we only lost by 11,” Numbers coach Bonnie Koerner said. “All of the other games we lost by 20 or more. Next week we play Powerhouse and hopefully we will get a third place victory.”

About the team’s season she added, “I had a great time. They went from fifth place to the consolation game, so that gives us a lot of heart, a lot of guts.”

Next week the Gay and Lesbian Times will have complete coverage of the basketball championship game between Moby Dick’s and Morgan Stanley and the third place consolation game between Numbers and Powerhouse Gym.