Salt Lake City Talent Rises; Valley Takes a Fall, 109-91

It took 5 tries, but Derwin (Tank) Collins finally got the perfect alley-oop pass he was pleading for throughout Wednesday night’s game between Valley College and Salt Lake City.

Collins, a 6-foot, 4-inch sophomore forward from Pomona High, took a lob pass from Matt Barnes and threw down a reverse slam dunk with 6:28 left that gave Salt Lake City an 11-point lead en route to a 109-91 victory in the championship game of the Valley tournament.

“We have some great athletes,” Salt Lake City Coach Dave Osborn said. “And when they play together, we’re pretty much unbeatable.”

Salt Lake City, ranked 10th in the nation in one preseason poll, improved to 12-3, scoring more than 100 points for the 14th time this season.

The Bruins’ roster features 3 former high school All-Americans, including Collins and former Crenshaw standout John Staggers.

Staggers was absent from Wednesday night’s game but the Bruins hardly felt the effect as Collins led the way with 31 points. Melvin Love, a 6-10 sophomore center who has signed with Nevada Las Vegas, added 21 points and former Carson High guard Issy Washington had 18.

Salt Lake City led, 51-47, at halftime behind the play of Collins, who scored 20 points--many on breakaway dunks.

The Bruins led by 7 points early in the second half before Valley guard Tory Stephens took the Monarchs on a short run that ended when Oral Elrington completed a 3-point play that put Valley on top, 68-67, with 12:40 left.

The Valley lead was short-lived, however, as Salt Lake City rallied behind 2 baskets by Love and 3 in a row by Anthony January, yet another former Southern California player, from Carson High.

The Bruins were ahead, 86-77, when Collins slipped along the baseline, went up uncontested for Barnes’ alley-oop, and jammed it through the net behind his head.

“When he got that dunk, it broke our backs,” said Stephens, who had a team-high 25 points for Valley (8-6).

Valley pulled to within 90-82 before Salt Lake City launched a 16-3 run over the last 5 minutes to put the game away.

“We played very well for three quarters but they just had too much manpower,” Valley Coach Jim Stephens said.