Larry Jewell

3, 2, 1. We're talking with coach Tom Bennett, the head basketball coach at Mesa Community College. Coach, once again, it's Mesa versus Dixie in a regional tournament. That happened two years ago. Yes, it did. And I would think this should be equally as good a game. That one came down to a last shot in the last second. I hope when the last seconds get there, we still got a chance this time. Your ball club seems to have a tradition of pretty good balance and always being tough towards the end of the season especially. I don't know if we call that tradition. Perhaps it is. I think every team you have is different and this one has a little bit different character, a little different personality than some we've had, but they play usually very well together and that's perhaps the prime requisite of being in a tournament team. Two years ago against Dixie, one point victory for Mesa last weekend. I understand it was a one point victory against Yavapai in your own league tournament. Yes. That's a strange game. That was a strange game. We didn't score the last six minutes of the game and we only had three point lead at that time. But it was strange. It was a one point victory. We're glad to have it. Only the difference to that one was that it, it put us on our home court tonight as opposed to all of us playing up at Yavapai. Let's talk about your team just a little bit. Elliot Jones, tremendous ballpark. Elliot's a very good athlete. He's a very good athlete. Unusual thing about Elliot is he's our leading scorer and he's probably also our best defender. There was a time he was injured this year. Yes, not a real serious injury, but one that kept him from being as strong physically or. Well, physically. And that affected him more on a defensive end of the court than he did on the offensive. He can score most nights, but the things he has to do defensively, he has to be healthy to do them. Coach Tom Bennett, what do you look for tonight? The key against Dixie? Well, I think we have to do a reasonable job with their transition game and I think rebounds will be a factor. Dixie's a very high scoring club, very well coached. Probably no finer coach in this region than Neal Roberts, and it's an honor to have our team here and play against him again. Coach Tom Bennett, you've had some success against Neil Roberts. You've won more than you've lost. I don't think so. I think we're two and two. I think we are two and two. I don't I can't tell you that for sure. I know that the year we beat him here in the regional, we had beaten him earlier in the year, and I know he beat us last year in that early season tournament. We're two and two or two and one, something like that. I don't know what it is. Maybe you know better than I. Coach Tom Bennett, good luck tonight. Thank you for being with us. Thank you. Coach Neil Roberts at Dixie College is almost deja vu. This happened two years ago, Dixie versus Mesa, first game of the regional tournament. We just hope the outcome is a little bit different last year or two years ago in that situation, we lost by one point, had two shots at the end of the game and couldn't get one to go in. And we were that close to going to the national championships two years ago. We hope we can get that turned around. Tom Bennett, your opposing number, opposing coach, has a reputation of bringing his kids along well towards the end of the year. Yes, he has. He's one of the best coaches in junior college basketball at the present time. He really molds these kids together. He makes them play together as a team. He brings them along defensively, he brings them along offensively. He does a good job. Your ball club seems to have peaked now. Well, isn't that what we play for? It's nice to win all of them, but it's a lot better to win the games that matter at the end of the year. Yes, we feel like we're playing our very best basketball right now. I think every team that's left is playing excellent basketball right now. There's only about 30, 40 junior college teams still playing in the United States at the present time. It's our goal to get to the final 16 and then from there to the Final Four and so on. Well, we got the Final Four last year, ended up third. It sure would be nice to win one more ball game, but more important than that, it would be nice to win the regional. We didn't win the conference. We were 8 and 2. We had the same conference record as we had last year. Our win loss is not quite as good because I feel like the competition is. There's been Several people in St. George mentioned to me they felt like we were fortunate to have won 21 ball games because we didn't have the talent we had last year. I don't agree with that. I think we have as good, if not better talent this year than we had last year. What about this schedule? It's been as tough a schedule as Dixie's ever played. Will this prove out tonight whether it's been good for you or not? It has to be good for us because at this stage of the game, you're playing the best teams in the country. If you're not ready to play the best teams by playing consistently game in and game out, then you're not ready. We played as good a basketball schedule as any junior college team in the nation. One question some people have John Baucom has been coming on great of late. He sometimes seems to do better off the bench, although he's done well starting. Which way will he go tonight? He'll start, he'll start. But we'll use Tim, probably John and Ham about equal time. Tim's playing exceptionally well right now and really adds a different dimension to our team. He's a good rebounder, works extremely hard. Tim's improvement this year has been phenomenal. You saw Mesa and they're league tournament last week. What's the key for Dixie? Well, to be patient against a really aggressive man defense. They really get down and play hard. They are as intense defensively and fundamentally as any team I've ever seen. They playing on their home court here in front of their home people. It's going to be a tough task, but we also have to do that. If we can play as good a defense, we are a better offensive team. They have real good quickness and they're really intelligent. Coach Neil Roberts, thank you for being with us. Good luck tonight. Thank you, Larry.