In a packed gym on Western Avenue Tuesday night, the crowd was going insane.

Make it Rain had a four-point lead on their rival team, Mayheim, with less than a minute on the clock. Then, out of nowhere, came Sherron Collins. The NCAA-championship-winning former Kansas point guard took the basketball, dribbled down the court and put up a shot from atop the three-point line …

Swish.

Make it Rain took their time moving the ball back down the court. They held a slim one-point lead, but needed to make a basket to stave off Mayheim’s late-game rally.

They stumbled, and Collins suddenly had the ball again. But he lost his footing running down court. Trapped, and unable to make a move, he fell out of bounds.

That was it. Collins and Mayheim had lost, Make it Rain had won — the game was over.

The 450 people packed into the gym at Phoenix Military Academy on Western stormed the court in excitement. They were thrilled at the chance to see great home-grown hoops players for free, as they have been for the last four years with the West Haven Safe Summer Basketball League.

Tuesday’s game was the beginning of the playoffs for the Safe Summer League, the finale of a program that draws people from all over the city, focusing on teaching life skills and providing a positive outlet for energy in the community.

The Safe Summer League takes 230 players each year, from fifth graders up to adults. For the younger kids, the program offers structured programming that keeps them off the streets and gets them to focus positively on their future.

“Our main objective is what we set out to do, and that’s give people a place to beat the streets,” said Earnest Gates, executive director of the Near West Side Community Development Corporation. “It hasn’t changed.”

Running from mid-June through August 18, the programming is scheduled in the late afternoons and early evenings — a time slot designed to keep those at-risk youths out of trouble and in a productive environment. Gates said they haven’t had any problems related to the program. It’s an indicator that things are on the right path, he said.

“This is our fourth year, and it’s been incident free,” he said. “It’s saying a lot that we haven’t had anything close to an argument, much less anything worse than that.”

That’s saying something, especially for the massive crowds that pack in for the league’s biggest draw: its adult matches.

The league draws some of Chicago’s best semi-pro basketball products. This year, Kansas’ Collins (who had a brief stint with Michael Jordan’s Charlotte Bobcats last season before going to Europe to play) was one of the top players. After all, he did beat Derrick Rose’s Memphis team in the 2008 NCAA championship.

In the past, Gates said, the Orlando Magic’s Gilbert Arenas has played in the tournament, and other NBA players — including Rose — have sponsored teams.

For the adults, it’s a place to get some high-quality competition on the court and keep their skills sharp for trips back to the European league or hopefully, the NBA.

But the high quality competition also packs the house with fans — another, more indirect way of keeping people off the streets. On Tuesday night, one end of the Phoenix parking lot was so packed that cars had boxed each other in. Outside the school halfway through the second game, about a dozen people crowded around a door, hoping to be let in.

Inside, the bleachers were packed, and crowds of people stood in the corners around the court, hoping to get a look at the action.

It was all part of the fun for the crowd. Charles Parker, 40, said he comes to watch Safe Summer League games as often as he can, and he has for the last four years.

“I come to check out the game and the top players out of college,” he said. “It’s good to see them bringing their talents back into the neighborhood.”

Jazz Brown, 27, agreed. The level of play makes the games worth watching, she said.

“Since it’s in the summer, everybody’s back from Europe,” she said. “Competition is more intense.”

As he was clearing everyone out of the gym at the end of the night Tuesday, Gates couldn’t help but agree in his recap of the game’s harrowing finish.

“They pushed it hard ’til the final buzzer,” he said.