The Enid Outlaws will attempt to repeat as The Basketball League Champions starting tonight, Wednesday, June 8th against Dallas Skyline. Based on the Outlaws excellent regular season record of 20-4, they received a bye in the first round of the playoffs to set up this best 2 of 3 matchup here at home.
Dallas Skyline finished the regular season 18-6 and faced the Sugar Land Imperials in round 1. Dallas swept Sugar Land 2-0 by scores of 113-98 and 125-111, setting up the second-round matchup with Enid. Dallas is led by the two headed monster of Guard Alexander Cooper (#30) – (20.2 PPG, 4.8 APG, 5.1 RPG) and Guard Logan Hicks (#2) – (20.4 PPG, 45.5% 3-Point). Forward Marcus Merchant (#11) led the league in blocks at 2.4 per game. He is also a good rebounder at 9.8 RPG, so the Outlaws will need to keep him off the boards as much as possible.
Despite being part of the same conference, Enid and Dallas only played once this season. In that game, Enid dominated from the tip and won going away, 136-110. Kadavion Edwards had 31 points on 11 of 15 shooting to pace the Outlaws. Ricardo Artis II had 22 points to go along with 21(!) rebounds. The Outlaw defense was able to slow down their star Cooper, who only had 3 points on 8 shots.
Despite the lopsided victory, Enid is not taking their opponent lightly. Team Market Owner Jonathan Reed said “We’ve been working hard to prepare for this round, and the guys are looking good. We really need to get this first one, so we start off on a good note and are able to make another championship run. Ricky (Artis) and Chuck (Guy) both played for Dallas before, so it’ll be fun for them to compete and get a win against their old team, too.”
Tipoff for Game 1 is at 7:00 p.m. at the Stride Bank Center. Tickets start at $10 and are available at www.stridebankcenter.com or at the ticket office prior to the game. Game 2 is Thursday, June 9th also at 7:00 at the Stride Bank Center.
