SUFFOLK COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

Smaller scale, but Selden's streak just as good

46 wins in a row is still 46 wins in a row,

no matter what level

    Suffolk CC-Selden basketball coach Rich Wrase knows what his team is accomplishing would be a much bigger deal in Division I, where every victory would be chronicled and lauded on ESPN and other major media throughout the country. Clearly, it hasn't been all Suffolk, all the time.

The yield for 46 straight basketball victories at Suffolk CC-Selden, a Division III junior college, is something far less. ``I go into the bagel store and the guy says 'Aren't you the Suffolk coach?' " Wrase said. "I want my life back, my privacy back."

Suffolk never had more than a few dozen fans at home games. This season it was several hundred and even a thousand or more a few times. One fan came with a chihuahua puppy. That's dogged determination.

Now, for whomever is watching, the streak is strictly business. One loss and not only is the streak history, but so is the season. Midnight strikes and even the relatively mild publicity Suffolk has received recedes into the darkness. The Region XV tournament begins Friday at upstate Sullivan CC and Suffolk (28-0) puts it all on the line. First up is eighth-seeded Rockland [9-19], which Suffolk dismantled, 93-55, Jan. 17.

But weird things happen in tournaments. Thirty-four years ago an eighth-seeded Suffolk nearly upset tournament favorite Westchester CC in what had been a most memorable moment for this program until Wrase came in and made winning an every game occurrence. It's one-and-done from this point on. "Once you start thinking about it, anything can happen," forward Vernon Alonzo said.

On the winning streak of their collective lives, this Suffolk County-grown team doesn't need the lights, cameras and microphones to validate their accomplishment. "For me, being on a team like this is the greatest thing in my life," forward Marcele Street said.

Dick Vitale doesn't need to tell him what a great college basketball team this is.

Street has been recuperating from a deep muscle bruise to his leg, and in his absence, the team kept winning. Street missed the last three regular season games. "If they are bumped and bruised, they still play and I appreciate it," Wrase said. "I couldn't get better kids than I have if I went around the county and hand picked them."

To the players, their streak is more significant than the ones at Stanford or St. Joseph's or even the NBA Nets. "I wake up and go to sleep with it," guard/forward Maurice Manning said. "To be part of something like this, you got to love it. It's a big world out there and we're trying to put Suffolk on the map."

And don't tell Suffolk this is any less important than those more publicized college or NBA streaks. "Bologna," Street said. "We're talented and that's that."

There was a time when Wrase thought a regular-season loss might help refocus the team for the larger goal, which is defending the regional and national title. Overtime victories against rival Suffolk CC-Brentwood and Hostos let Suffolk know invincibility is not a word worth using.

"We came too close to losing, I think that almost adds up to a loss," Street said. "We're just going to play ball and do what we do."

No letdown is possible at this point. "They know what is at stake," the 53-year-old Wrase said. "I think it's kind of amazing. The 1980-81 team here won 18 in a row and I said it would be nice to do that. When we did that, I said it would be nice to make 30. Then we got to 40."

The team wants 50 straight. Three victories would earn the regional title and put the streak at 49. Three more after that and the Clippers would repeat as national champions with 52 straight.

Losing is not an option.
Copyright © 2004, Newsday, Inc.

Suffolk's Street likely to return for first round

BY TOM ROCK
NEWSDAY STAFF WRITER
February 27, 2004

   Suffolk CC-Selden likely will have one of its best players back for the Region XV men's basketball tournament that begins today at Sullivan CC.
    Marcele Street, who has not played since Feb. 12 because of a stress fracture in his right fibula, was cleared to play earlier in the week and coach Rich Wrase said there is a 75- to 80-percent chance Street will play in the opening round.
   "We're taking it real easy, a little shooting, a little jogging," Wrase said of the 6-5 forward who is averaging 17.4 points and 8.5 rebounds.
   Suffolk (28-0) enters the tournament on a 46-game winning streak and as the top seed. It will face No. 8 Rockland CC (9-18) in the first round at 7 p.m. The stage could be set for an all-Suffolk showdown in the final. No. 2 Suffolk-Brentwood (15-8) opens its tournament against TCI (13-15) at 5 p.m. Nassau CC (17-11) is the No. 4 seed and will face host Sullivan CC (24-6) at 1 p.m. The semifinals are tomorrow evening and the championship game for the trip to the NJCAA Tournament in two weeks is Sunday.
   Suffolk-Selden's Maurice Manning, who averaged 23.8 points this season, was named the MVP of Region XV. Marcele Street was named to the second team.
Copyright © 2004, Newsday, Inc.

 
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