STATE CHAMPS! -- Chips fall into place for Harris, Lowery, Thunder

GLENDALE -- One can’t help but wonder if Chandler Hamilton senior Ryan Evans or Gilbert Highland junior Chris Johnson were somehow watching the Desert Vista boys basketball team win the Class 5A-Division I title Friday night.

At one point or another over the past four years, Evans and Johnson each spent significant time as part of coach Doug Harris’ Desert Vista hoops program, which just competed in the big arena - the state semifinals or better - for the sixth time in seven seasons.

Also Friday: Thunder down Knights in Glendale

The reasons for the departure from the Desert Vista campus for both of these young men aren’t relevant to this argument. Albeit not ending with a state title, for all intents and purposes transferring was the right move for both, and paid off handsomely on the basketball court in many regards.

Evans spent this season as Hamilton’s unequivocal floor leader, scoring more than 18 points and carding seven rebounds per game while Johnson averaged 10 points and seven boards himself in his first year at Highland.

And after all, Hamilton was only 16-seconds of chaos away from facing Desert Vista itself in the title game, while Highland, despite a first-round upset loss, entered the state tournament as the most consistent 5A-I team all season, and the bracket’s top overall seed.

The situations of Evans and Johnson do create an interesting back-story to Desert Vista’s title run, however.

Here’s a team that’s been the model of consistent excellence on the Arizona big-school prep landscape for pretty much the entire decade.

Yet, still, it’s been on the short side - again, that’s still not to say Evans and Johnson’s reasons weren’t just or warranted - of the transfer game on multiple occasions.

To put it in perspective, imagine if Harris’ team had both Johnson and Evans in its lineup. Who wouldn’t see a roster that includes speedy Marcus Lever and dynamic wing Will Bond joining forces with the 6-foot-6 Johnson, 6-foot-8 Michael Proctor and 6-foot-6 Barret Robbins, let alone the cast of reserves and role players crucial to the Thunder’s title-run this year, still winning the 2008 crown anyway?

But one name from this year’s title-winning squad was left out, however, and a rather pertinent one at that.

Junior guard Josh Lowery, who spent the entire season as Harris’ floor general, averaged 12 points and scored a career-high 21 on the biggest stage of all - Friday’s title tilt with Phoenix St. Mary’s.

Why the omission of Lowery’s name? Because the 6-foot-3 junior guard was a transfer himself, coming to the Valley this season from Seattle to help the Thunder win its first-ever state hoops banner.

Lowery’s successful transition at DV only heightens the age-old fact that sometimes the chips just fall into place.

After all, wasn’t last year supposed to be the Thunder’s turn to win it all anyway, when they were the tournament’s No. 1 overall seed after winning 27 of 28 regular season games (with their only loss coming by a single point)?

Call it a sweet irony; Harris calls it “things coming full circle.”

“It was just our time - finally - I guess,” Harris said with a laugh, adding that it is good to eventually see the see the other side of the transfer issue first-hand.

“We don’t really have stars. We do things by committee. Say Proctor doesn’t play well. Someone else is going to step up,” he added. “Tonight it was Josh, and he’s been doing that all year.”

Harris and Lowery agreed that assimilating into a new team is a give and take both the receiving and arriving end of the deal. But Harris contends that Lowery was more than happy to live up to his end of the bargain, and the rest of the team in return.

“We got blessed getting Josh in,” Harris said. “To his credit, he’s been awesome. To come in a whole new situation, new school, to have to make new friends; he’s come in and become a leader right away this year.”

For Lowery, feeling like Arizona - and Desert Vista - was actually his home now sure did help.

“I wouldn’t want to be on any other team in the state, any other team in the country,” he said. “This is my family now.”