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Viking Champions: Ernie Flores
CHICAGO, IL (May 30, 2003) - Ernie Flores was a senior guard at North Park and
enjoyed his role as the team's top reserve as the Vikings won their first
championship. "It was a fun journey," said Flores in describing the 1977-78
season. "We thought we were going to be better than the previous year, but
we had no idea we would be 29-2 and national champs.
"We beat Augustana College (second in the conference the previous year) and
then I realized that we were going to be great," Flores continued. "They
were always very tough and they had a really good team. We were gradually
getting better and enjoying all of the hoopla in the newspapers and on
campus. It got more special every game as we were piling on the victories."
Flores had gone to high school just a few yards from the college - at Von
Steuben High where he was an All-Section basketball player (he is now a
member of the Chicago Public League athletic Hall of Fame). He fit in well
at North Park, where his scrappy defense and occasional bursts of offense
meshed nicely with an emerging group of scoring threats.
During his senior year, Flores scored a career-high 17 points in a victory
over California State University-Hayward, which he called his top
individual performance. But, like many on his team, the personal accolades
paled to the team goals that were accomplished and the efforts made by
other teammates. He remembered the consistent shooting of fellow classmate
Tom Florentine, the impressive freshman year of point guard Michael Thomas
and the improvement made by sophomore Modzel Greer among the reasons the
Vikings became so successful.
"When you go back and look at it, it's really amazing that we won three
championships in a row," he said. "There's always something that can happen
and it only takes one bad game to blow it."
After graduating from college, Flores became a junior high school physical
education teacher in Franklin Park, a Chicago suburb. He has been there
ever since. He lives in Addison with his wife, Bari, and their three
children. Although Flores said he hasn't played much basketball since
college, he became a highly regarded high school and college referee - he
officiated the Class AA state boys basketball tournaments in 1998 and 1999.
Flores won't soon forget his experience at North Park - pictures from the
national basketball season adorn his home. He said the quarterfinal playoff
game against Humboldt State University was his most enduring memory,
although the idea of going to Arcata, California, didn't thrill him at
first. "It was a great win, the way we came back," he said. "But we
actually were disappointed at first (about going to California) because we
weren't going to play at Chaminade University. If they had beaten Humboldt
State (in the West regional finals), they would've been our opponent and we
would've traveled to Hawaii."
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