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In it’s second game of the season, Denver South lost to Eaglecrest by 22 points. In its fourth game, South lost to Lakewood by 23.
Yes, South resides in Class 4A and those are 5A schools. Yet, this was a squad with high expectations. The Rebels had opened the 2013-14 boys basketball campaign ranked No. 4 in CHSAANow.com’s preseason poll. But 10 days into its season, South was 2-5, only owned an in-state win over 3A Faith Christian, and had those two early routs on its resume.
“Through the whole process, we were just building for March,” first-year coach Malik Fletcher said on Monday. “We didn’t care who was the best team in December, January. We wanted to be the team that was playing in March.
“So the kids kept that concept and, even when we were struggling, the main thing was that they had to own it,” Fletcher said. “We knew in our minds that it would turn around, we would get to that point that where we’d be playing good basketball.”
Since that 2-5 start, Denver South is 16-3. Those three losses — to Thomas Jefferson, Denver West and Denver East — came by a combined seven points.
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Saturday, the Rebels punched their ticket to the final four. They’ll play Cheyenne Mountain at CU’s Coors Events Center at 5:30 p.m. Friday.
Asked for a turning point, Fletcher pinpoints a 71-65 win over Pueblo East on Jan. 10.
Up until then, the Rebels were missing a few football players, as well as transfers who had their eligibility restricted to 50 percent of the season. They didn’t have everyone back against Pueblo East, but “it was getting to a point where we were starting to see the rest of the team,” Fletcher said.
“We didn’t even take our full squad to Pueblo,” Fletcher said. “But winning that game was big for the kids, for them to believe and see it — winning in that gym, with a great coach and a great program like that.”
Now, South is in its first final four since 1970. The players are well aware of that fact.
“We’ve talked about the unique history of just South itself, the basketball program,” said Fletcher, who had been an assistant at South prior to taking over this season. “A lot of the kids we have right now, we brought them in when we were freshmen, and they started getting the message early on that they were going to be successful when they graduated.
“These last few weeks we have reiterated the importance of doing something special with South and with Colorado sports itself.”
South gets key contributions from all over. Included are guards Tyson Purifoy (12.5 points, 4.3 rebounds, 3.0 assists), Lorenzo Snoddy (11.2 points, 6.8 rebounds) and Antonio Garcia (9.8 points, 4.2 assists).
Make no mistake, though: The Rebels are led by ultra-athletic senior Ibrahim Sylla, a Northern Colorado commit who averages 14.8 points, 14.7 rebounds and 3.8 blocks per game.
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In South’s Great 8 win over Thomas Jefferson, the 6-foot-8, 190-pound Sylla was a monster. His dunks so abused the basket during the first quarter that he ended up moving the hoop 3 inches off its moorings and causing a 10-minute delay. Sylla finished with 20 points and 13 rebounds, but also had a game-clinching steal in the final moments.
Fletcher said Sylla’s greatest strengths were “definitely the physical attributes and gifts that he has.”
“But,” Fletcher quickly added, “what has really impressed me is his growth and how much he continues to grow. It’s exciting just to see how far he is away from maxing out and hitting his ceiling.”
To top everything off, Sylla has an aggressive streak not common in high school players.
“I mean he’s intense, he’s aggressive. He really doesn’t back down,” Fletcher said. “Once he’s engaged, there’s no one else around that can probably match with his intensity along with his physical attributes.”