Aces cement spot in city’s burgeoning sports scene

AS the final seconds of their inaugural season filtered through the hourglass and ticked off the clock around Flavor Flav’s neck as he hip-hopped around courtside, it occurred to one longtime observer of Las Vegas’ pro sports scene that the WNBA’S Aces had lasted longer than the Posse of the Canadian Football League.

The Posse almost made it to the end of their only season in 1994.

The team couldn’t make payroll and essentially folded ahead of its last game at Sam Boyd Stadium before the CFL wrote checks to save face.

The game was moved to Edmonton at short such notice that Eskimos fans who had chartered flights to Las Vegas couldn’t cancel. So a bunch of people wearing green and gold toques wound up watching the game on a feed pumped into a ballroom at the old Imperial Palace after truckloads of Labatt’s Blue were pumped in first.

To no one’s surprise, Aces coach Bill Laimbeer didn’t mention any of this during his postgame news conference.

“Off the court, I think we established our fan base,” said Laimbeer, the baddest of the Detroit Pistons’ Bad Boys as an NBA player. “I think we have a very proud fan base that’s growing.”

After he thanked MGM Grand and Mandalay Bay for creating a raucous

KANTOWSKI

The Aces pounded out eight hits, including a two-run home run in the fourth by Chaison Miklich.

Desert Oasis chased Gonzales starter Merrifield in the fifth, when a walk to Jordan Demarce and consecutive singles by Jason Sharman and Parker Schmidt loaded the bases. With two outs, Merrifield walked Aaron Roberts to score Demarce and make it 4-0. Austin Bankert relieved Merrifield but walked Gamboa, to score Sharman, and Zach Czerniawski, to score Schmidt, to make it 6-0.

Gamboa completed the 15th one-hitter in ALWS history.

This is the second consecutive Nevada team to reach the ALWS title game. Basic, with the summer moniker Southern Nevada Blue Sox, won last year’s title.