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Showing posts with label The Playoffs (2015). Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Playoffs (2015). Show all posts
Texts between Paul Jones and me
about Laney's Aliyah Collier.
Monday's post was about Laney's boys and their state playoff semifinal loss to Morgan County. That splendid game was not the only basketball I watched Saturday. On a happier note for Laney's fans, the Lady Wildcats that same day advanced to the state championship game with a 63-37 win over Decatur.
It is easy for me to understand why Saturday's semifinal game started somewhat sloppy. The high stakes contest on Columbus State's court is an experience no coach can replicate for his players to rehearse before the day comes. So jitters are likely partly to blame for the teams' trouble finishing seemingly easy opportunities around the basket.
But as you can see in the screen shots from texts traded between Paul Jones (a former player of mine who filmed the games in Columbus while I was in Clemson) and me, I would readily believe the activity exerted by Laney's Aliyah Collier (the #12 referred to in the text exchange) was as much the source of Decatur's inability to score as nerves were.
The Lady Wildcats head to Macon Saturday to compete for a state championship. I expect Collier and her teammates will once again "leave it all on the floor," as they have all season long.
My blog post below may read like Morgan County's Tookie Brown was solely responsible for Saturday's win. Not so. Morgan County has a great team. Laney too. Hopefully my video report above does both teams justice.
A reader of this blog and I have been texting since Laney fell to Morgan County 68-62 Saturday in the semifinals of the state playoffs. The question I have been asked is "how can one player beat a team like Laney?" The answer is easy. No matter what the upside projecting recruiting experts think, when it comes to winning basketball games, there is no better high school player in our state than Morgan County's Tookie Brown, especially when he has a second half like Saturday when he scored 32 points. My good friend Keenan Mann's remark gives some insight into how impressive a feat that is: "That is literally one bucket every minute for a whole half." An unbelievable performance.
Before Saturday I believed the only just outcome for coach Harris's team would be a state championship. It is no secret I am a huge fan of the program. After watching the team's 29 game winning streak and the way the guys accomplished it with stunning class, I couldn't stomach the thought of the pain they would go through if they were to come up short. And honestly it took a little while to get over the pain I felt thinking about the pain they were likely feeling after Saturday's loss.
Laney won 29 straight games against the toughest schedule an area team has ever played.
But the text conversation with my friendly reader helped to clarify my thoughts. I now understand there was always more than one "just outcome" for our beloved Wildcats. And Saturday's outcome, the temporarily more painful one, is a true testament to the team's greatness that the only thing that could derail the Wildcats was what had to be the best performance ever by one of the greatest high school players our state has seen.
No matter that the final game of Laney's season was a loss. I still believe this team is as great as any our area has ever seen. And state title or not, there is only one other team I believe may have been as great.
The video above is obviously the last game report of the 2014-2015 season featuring Laney's boys team. Congratulations to the Wildcats for having a historically great season.
Senior Jashawn Brooks scored 25 points to lead Laney
I try to put meaningful information and insight into my posts about area basketball. I have commented about Laney countless times this season. Not once have I asked for a particular player's point total after a Laney game. The number of points scored by one player is never the story behind Laney's success, in my opinion. But tonight I had to double back and find coach Buck Harris to ask how many points senior Jashawn Brooks scored. His 25 points led the Wildcats to a 92-67 third round win in fellow number one seed East Hall's gym. Brooks's barrage of threes was the story tonight. Kind of. Let me explain.
That a player with Jashawn's size, athleticism, and basketball smarts has a shooting stroke as sweet as his is noteworthy. But there are so many noteworthy things about Laney's team that it is easy to lose track of the gifts of any one player. Brooks's three pointer that swished right as the second quarter buzzer sounded put Laney ahead 39-27. And this was just the beginning of an array of bombs from the senior leader as Laney would score 49 points during the game's next 12 minutes before nursing its 20+ point lead in the game's final minutes.
Coach Buck Harris had high praise for junior point guard Zep Jasper
But as well as Jashawn played, there were long stretches of time when other Wildcats carried the offensive load. Junior Collin Young gave his team an early ten point lead with a string of key baskets during the first half. And the Wildcats exploited a matchup advantage inside by isolating senior Jaylen Taylor, who finished at the rim consistently.
A key to all of this scoring coming from all of these sources was the control of the offense exhibited by junior point guard Zep Jasper. Coach Harris shared an interesting tidbit after the game when he commended Jasper's play against East Hall's full court pressure. Zep handled it so well that I told Buck I didn't even notice he was facing a full court trap!
No player on Laney's team averages more than 13 points per outing. So many different guys have made winning contributions during the team's 27 game winning streak. I would predict anyone who saw Thursday's game would tell you Brooks was on fire. But they may not immediately guess that he scored a ton of points. That's because when it comes to Laney, a team in the truest sense of the word, a single player scoring a lot of points is never the story. Even when it kind of is.
There was a lot of joy Tuesday when
the Lady Wildcats' victory was in hand.
I won't write a big post tonight. I figure the Lady Wildcats did enough talking for me with their inspired play in defeating the state's #1 team, undefeated Dawson County.
I said in the video above this was one of the best games I've seen all season. I meant it. That this team can send this fan base home with that experience on the night of the Wildcats' last home game is story book stuff.
Enjoy the video report from the game. And check out the AugBball Instagram and Facebook pages for photos and short stories from the game starting Wednesday morning.
Jaylen Taylor has been teaching me
"the Laney rule" all season.
I have discovered a law of nature I'll call "the Laney rule." This rule applies only to camera operators. Luckily players, coaches, and fans need not learn the Laney rule. But people like me who aim to capture and share all the goodness found at Laney games (boys and girls) ignore it at our own peril.
The Laney rule simply dictates that while the ball is in play, cameras must roll. I relearned the Laney rule Saturday in the teams' sweet sixteen round blowout wins. If the camera isn't rolling, I am likely to miss Jaylen Taylor gliding through the air for a rim shaking dunk. Or Aliyah Collier will steal the ball in the back court and hit a cutting De'sha Benjamin, who will finish in stride with her left hand. Or coach Buck Harris will holler "four," prompting the floor to be spread, and Zep Jasper will dart to the hoop or bury a three off the bounce.
In the video above, I try to show you what I mean by the Laney rule. The Wildcats teams are those rare teams that even make blowouts like Saturday's must see events!
Last week was "Championship Week." Today started my weekend to focus on what I'll call "the best games in town." I once used that description only for GRU games. The Jags, currently riding a 9 game winning streak, still deserve the distinction. And as I look at my near term schedule, I see four other local teams (Laney, Paine College, Laney's girls, and Greenbrier's girls) who have earned that special status as well. First, I'll share my schedule, then I'll share with you the results of my weekend's first game.
My AugBball weekend schedule:
GRU's homecoming game Saturday (noon) is one of five
games I'll try to see, and report on this weekend.
Friday: Greenbrier lost a heart breaker to Gainesville on a buzzer beater in the sweet sixteen round of the playoffs. See the full report of this game directly below this schedule.
Saturday (3 PM): Paine College, who recently improved to 20-5 and clinched the regular season SIAC title, faces rival Benedict College.
Saturday (5 PM and 6:30 PM): Laney's girls and boys will host sweet sixteen playoff action to wrap up a great weekend of Augusta Basketball!
Game Report: Gainesville 47, Greenbrier 45 (sweet sixteen round of the state playoffs)
Highly competitive basketball teaches lessons to all involved. The learning opportunity Friday was to see, in a game, how sometimes life doesn't always seem fair. After Greenbrier sprinted out to an early 11-2 lead, senior Morgan Taylor and three other starters were hampered by foul trouble throughout the game. Playing for the final ten minutes of the first half with one starter (senior Jennifer McMahan) on the floor, Greenbrier struggled to stay even. And after an early second half Gainesville run, the Lady Wolfpack trailed 34-26 and had lost its first player (Destiny Marshall) to a fifth foul. Ever the leader and competitor, Taylor kept her poise and led a furious Lady Wolfpack comeback to erase the deficit. And after McMahan put in two late jump shots, Greenbrier led 45-41.
After Gainesville battled back to even with fewer than 30 seconds remaining, Taylor made a nifty crossover dribble, slashed into the paint and floated in a sweet bank shot for what appeared to be the game winner. But the official call was a charge on Taylor, the fifth foul for the Naval Academy bound senior. A review of the play in the accompanying video will probably leave the impression that the correct call would have been a block or no call at all.
But a time like this is when the game teaches us we are not measured by our results, but by the effort we give, and by the way we respond to the breaks we get. Lucky or unlucky. My prediction is Taylor and her teammates will respond like true champs.
If any Gainesville fans read this, I hope I am forgiven for dwelling on an unfortunate end to a highly respected area team's season. I hope not to leave the impression that the victory was not earned. The winners played very impressively, and I tried to tell an unbiased story in the video report above. It is much easier for me to talk about our home team here. Good luck to the Gainesville girls in the elite eight round of the playoffs.
Laney has played brilliant basketball all season. But what should be particularly worrisome to class AAA playoff participants is that for three consecutive games the Wildcats have been scorching hot from the field. The Wildcats scored 92 points in a region tournament semifinal victory over Josey, 40 in the first half of the championship game versus Washington County, and 85 Tuesday in the opening game of the state playoffs.
Laney's Zep Jasper is featured in the video above. Tonight
was the first game in weeks he didn't face AJ Gray (WACO),
Darius Williams (Josey), or Don Coleman (Butler).
Watch the second episode of "The Playoffs" above to see Zep Jasper, Jashawn Brooks, Christian Keeling and company lead Laney to a 44-18 halftime lead in front of a roaring, filled to capacity home crowd.
I've learned Butler, Josey, and Washington County lost Wednesday. Expect something special from me soon about the seniors on those teams.
Harlem won Wednesday. And I should know Aquinas and Augusta Christian's next move soon.
My weekend schedule will probably include the sweet sixteen round games for Greenbrier's girls, Laney's girls, Laney's boys, and Harlem's boys, as well as GRU's homecoming game.
And expect an update soon on the college hoops scene. At halftime of the Laney game, I left to see GRU hammer Francis Marion. I'll report on that here tomorrow. Until then, you know where to find me.
Greenbrier, fresh off a region tournament championship, defeated Carver 86-54
in the first round of the state playoffs Tuesday. Above is my (video) game report.
Taylor scored 21 in Tuesday's win
Watching Greenbrier dismantle Carver Tuesday in the first round of the AAAAA state playoffs, I discovered I've been right in thinking I have been missing out on seeing great basketball by not following the Lady Wolfpack. Senior Morgan Taylor led a fast paced attack fueled by an active defense and a relentless assault on the basket by sophomore Destiny Marshall and her. The home team scored in transition after steals and stops often faster than I could record the action.
When Taylor wasn't attacking,
Marshall applied the pressure.
The contributions came from everywhere. Sophomore center Sydney Grayden put back teammates' misses. Senior Jennifer McMahan ignited fast breaks with defensive rebounds and outlet passes, and Taylor usually either finished or found teammate Marshall for an uncontested layup.
The Lady Wolfpack are one of three local AAAAA teams (Cross Creek and Grovetown are the other two) who moved into the "sweet sixteen" round of the state playoffs. Friday's opponent is yet to be determined. Stay tuned as I attempt to follow the Lady Wolfpack and the other local boys and girls teams through the playoffs.
