BANGOR – Among the faces in the crowd during Saturday’s Class B boys basketball quarterfinals was Steve Clifford, an assistant coach with the NBA’s Houston Rockets. He was in town to watch his younger brother, Dan, coach Ellsworth to a narrow loss to top-ranked Camden Hills of Rockport.

Steve Clifford is in his second season on Jeff Van Gundy’s staff in Houston after three years with the New York Knicks, two as an assistant coach after one year as an advance scout.

A 1983 graduate of the University of Maine at Farmington where he played for coach Len MacPhee and captained the Beavers for two seasons, Clifford broke into coaching at Woodland High School, where he spent two seasons in the mid-1980s.

Clifford then entered the college ranks, with stops as an assistant coach at St. Anselm College in New Hampshire, Fairfield University in Connecticut, Boston University, and Siena College in upstate New York.

He then became head coach at Adelphi University in Garden City, N.Y., where he compiled a record of 86-36 and a winning percentage of .705 from 1995 to 1999. Clifford led Adelphi to four straight 20-win seasons and guided the team to four appearances in the NCAA Division II Tournament. Clifford returned to the Division I ranks at East Carolina for one year as an assistant before joining the Knicks’ staff.

Clifford was in Bangor during the NBA All-Star break. The Rockets, led by All-Stars Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady, entered the break riding an eight-game winning streak and with a 32-21 record, good for third place in the NBA’s Southwest Division and seventh place overall in the Western Conference.

Youth served in ‘D’ quarterfinal

So how did the Washburn girls, the 13th-ranked squad in Eastern Maine Class D, overcome a 1-11 start to earn a quarterfinal at the Bangor Auditorium?

“We kind of turned it around at the end of the year and finished up 6-3,” Beavers coach Leland Caron said after his squad fell to Ashland 55-37 Saturday night. “When were 0-10, we didn’t think we’d [get this far].”

Caron said the girls earned key wins against Easton, Greater Houlton Christian, and Van Buren, and got a shot of confidence with a 10-point loss to Ashland at home.

Then the Beavers upset No. 6 Hodgdon 45-41 in the prelims.

Washburn starts two freshmen plus another comes off the bench. Richelle Saucier scored a game-high 16 points as the team’s sixth man. Saucier is a transfer from Fort Fairfield.

“I’m really proud of our kids,” Caron said. “Hopefully with our youth we’ll be back next year.”