In two trips to the Glaxo-Smith-Kline Holiday Invitational in Raleigh, N.C., Rice has yet to lose and been part of two thrilling tournament finals.
Ten years ago, the Harlem powerhouse overcame DeMatha (Md.) for the title. Wednesday night, the Raiders bested Kinston (N.C.), 55-54, on Shane Southwell’s 18-footer with less than a second remaining, claiming the Shavlik Randolph Foundation Invitational division championship.
“We were looking to spread the floor, they had a halfcourt press, and we spread it out,” Rice coach Mo Hicks told The Post in a phone interview. “It left Shane room to create, do some things he needed to do. He just had the presence of mind to see the clock and be able to make that shot at the time.”
It capped a memorable 32 minutes of basketball. The Raiders, tops in The Post’s New York City boys basketball rankings, struggled from the get-go, falling behind 11-0 and 14-5 after the first quarter. They got even at 41 with 3:12 left in the third quarter, but were behind the whole way. Kinston’s Josh Benoit missed the front end of a 1-and-1 with 12.3 seconds left, leaving the door ajar.
It set up Southwell’s heroics. The Kansas State-bound senior hit a spinning right-handed leaner over Kinston’s Reggie Bullock with 0.3 seconds remaining. He initially was going to feed sharpshooter Jermaine Sanders, but the defense converged on the junior.
“Once I put the arc on the shot, I thought it was going in,” Southwell said. “But once it went in, I was like wow.”
Southwell said the tournament crown meant a great deal to the Raiders considering they fell short in the Chick-fil-A Classic Holiday Tournament last week, just two days before Christmas. They didn’t want to head home without any hardware.
“To get this one, a hard tournament, was big for us,” he said.
Emmanuel Andujar and Da’Shawn Suber led Rice (7-1) with 14 points apiece, Kadeem Jack, the tournament MVP, had 11 and Southwell followed with 10, and was named to the all-tournament team.
“Definitely shows a lot of character,” Hicks said. “These guys fought the whole game. They got out on us early. It was a rare game where we were behind. I thought [we] did a great job holding their composure and listening and being patient, and letting our defense create for our offense. We’re really good at doing that.”
Winning in Raleigh has become somewhat of a specialty, too. Ten years ago, the Raiders, led by Andre Barrett, Andre Sweet and Kyle Cuffe knocked off Maryland powerhouse DeMatha in a memorable final.
“This is one of those tournament we would like to come to often,” Hicks said. “We get to see some old friends that moved out here years ago.”
Said Southwell: “We must have the good luck charm here.”