Tommy Marcella hit the shot heard around the Sun as
Oxford took down
Windsor 20-17 in the Connecticut Unified basketball championship at Mohegan Sun Arena over the weekend Saturday.
With the first Unified title game in history knotted up 17-17 late in the second half, J.J. Garcia of Oxford swung the ball to Marcella with 12 seconds left. Marcella let a high-arching 3-pointer fly through the air and watched it sink through the net for a perfect swish, giving the Wolverines a 20-17 lead with 9.3 seconds remaining.
Marcella knew there was time left and held off celebrating to get right back on defense. When the clock hit zeroes, he was embraced by his teammates near mid-court.
"My favorite part was that we all played really well and did a really good job as a team this whole season," Marcella said during a postgame interview with the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference.
Garcia had another huge assist just moments earlier when he tossed the ball all the way down the floor to Quentin Glass that tied the game up. Glass finished with four points while Marcella led the team with seven.
Evan Kozek, Lucas Kingsley, Dayne Coy and Gabe Hernandez also found the scoresheet for Oxford.
Nate Mascola of Windsor led the game with eight points. Additionally, Germaine Williams, Razir Allah, Elijah Gordon and Nate Virola poured in points for the Warriors.
Mohegan Sun Arena has hosted the WNBA Finals and multiple All-Star games as the home of the Connecticut Sun. On March 15-16 the arena hosted all 11 CIAC basketball championships.
Unified Sports is a registered program of the Special Olympics that combines athletes with and without intellectual disabilities on sports teams for training and competitions.
