AISA RECAP: Evangel boys, girls fall in Class A title games; Morgan, Pike Road to meet in AAA championship
Tobias Stoutermire played a big role in Heritage Christian’s Class A state championship win on Saturday. (Tim Gayle)
By TIM GAYLE
The Heritage Christian Eagles certainly proved to be the best team in AISA Class A by running past Evangel Christian, 50-31, at the Multiplex at Cramton Bowl on Saturday night.
“For the most part, we did have guys coming back and we had guys ready to step up and be leaders,” Stoutermire said. “At the same time, sometimes with young people, when they’ve had success, (they think) we can skip the small steps. But I’ve got a great coaching staff, a bunch of great young men and I submit to the Lord and do what He asks me to do and I’m thankful it all culminated the way it did.”
The Eagles left no doubt in jumping out to a 23-3 lead and winning its third game in the state tournament by an average of 24.7 points per game.
“They hit some shots and we just couldn’t find opportunities to get clean looks,” Evangel coach Kerwin Washington said. “The better team won today.
Stoutermire said the early lead was something the Eagles had established in all three state tournament games, taking the fight out of their opponent quickly.
“We wanted to try to make sure that we did what we had to do to put doubt in their mind, play the best way we could,” he said. “Ultimately, we have a standard we’re trying to establish. We want to play the way our guys practice. Our guys spend a lot of time in the gym because they have goals beyond playing in high school.”
Washington, watching his team reach the state finals for the sixth consecutive year, only to fall short for the second year in a row, said his team needed the same level of dedication to the sport that Stoutermire has established at Heritage Christian.
“The guys were prepared,” Washington said. “We need to get some basketball kids, 100 percent locked into basketball. That’s what we need.”
Tobias Stoutermire was unstoppable in the paint, scoring 22 points, rebounding virtually every miss and blocking shots on the other end of the floor to keep the Lions from mounting any serious scoring threat.
“He has improved,” said Washington, who faced the junior center last year. “First off, the kid played pretty much the whole game. He didn’t get in foul trouble. What we’ve seen in the past, he was foul prone but he played a much more disciplined game. He led his team tonight.”
Heritage (23-5) also got 13 points from Michael Hart and 10 from Greyson Sanford. Kennedy Holland had 12 points to lead Evangel Christian (13-9).
The all-tournament team included Stoutermire, Sanford and Hart of Heritage Christian, Holland and Jeremiah Williams of Evangel Christian and Ray Albright of Coosa Valley.
Destiny Betton scores for Evangel Christian in Saturday’s Class A girls championship game at the Cramton Bowl Multiplex. (Tim Gayle)
Abbeville Christian tops Evangel girls
With its two best scorers on the bench for long stretches of the game, Evangel Christian found it difficult to produce enough offense to keep pace with Abbeville Christian Academy.
While the Lions had mastered the Generals in the two regular-season meetings between the two area rivals, they were no match for the defending state champions in the game that mattered the most as Abbeville Christian defeated Evangel 41-30 in the Alabama Independent School Association Class A finals at the Multiplex at Cramton Bowl on Saturday.
“Only two teams make it to the state championship game,” Evangel coach Haley Rosa said. “Like the referees tell us, somebody’s got to win, somebody’s got to lose, but you’ve got to put yourself in that position to be either one of those people. All year long, we worked on that. We just battled and tried to put ourselves in a position to win and that’s all you can do.”
But the Lions, who had double-digit victories in two previous meetings with Abbeville this season, found themselves struggling to score after center Zaria Johnson went out of the game with her second personal foul late in the first quarter. The team that had jumped out to a 19-0 lead over the Generals in the last meeting trailed 8-0 early, then lost its punch for the remainder of the first half without Johnson.
“We game plan without her for the majority of our games because we know she’s going to draw so much attention that we try not to run things through her and focus on her being our only scorer,” Rosa said. “We felt like today that our ‘X’ factors were going to be Destiny Betton and Ciara Williams and Destiny stepped up and played her game, but we just didn’t execute well down the stretch and didn’t do some of the things that we worked on.
“At the end of the day, missing free throws and layups will bite you in the tail and you can’t recover from it.”
Johnson returned briefly in the third quarter, only to quickly pick up her third foul, before the Lions were forced to play the remainder of the third quarter without their second leading scorer, Karley Blankenship, who took herself out of the game.
“They beat us by 14 (points) and 16 (in the regular season meetings), so we did something a little different,” Hall of Fame coach Ricky Ward said. “We always box No. 20 (Blankenship) we always front and behind on 24 (Zaria Johnson) but we were getting beat because of No. 10 (Kysha McNeely). So we put (Kayla) Dyson in the middle. We knew we were going to give up some points to No. 2 (Betton) and she got eight points.”
The strategy worked. Abbeville never seemed fully in control because of a rash of turnovers, but Evangel never found any offensive spark to pull back into the game.
“We haven’t ever had that many turnovers,” Ward said. “If they didn’t have foul trouble and we didn’t change our strategy, it quite possibly could have been the same outcome.”
Caroline Armstrong led Abbeville (16-9) with 19 points, followed by Anna Grace Blalock with 15. Blankenship led Evangel (12-9) with nine points, while Johnson had six.
Making the all-tournament team were Amiyah Govan, Armstrong and Blalock of Abbeville Christian, Betton and Blankenhip of Evangel Christian and Bryline Dailey of Jackson Academy.
CLASS AAA BOYS SEMIS
Morgan Academy 65, Bessemer Academy 26
Teddy Henry led a balanced attack with 13 points as the Senators fired out with a 22-point first quarter to take care of the Rebels in the AAA semifinals at the Multiplex at Cramton Bowl on Saturday afternoon.
Morgan (13-9) will play defending state champion Pike Liberal Arts for the AAA championship on Monday at 7 p.m.
Rhyne Williams added 11 points and Andrew Thomas had 10 as Morgan led 22-6 at the end of the first quarter and 29-12 at the half.
Samad Muhammad, who had 20 points in a quarterfinal win over Lee-Scott, was held to seven points for the Rebels.
Pike Liberal Arts 49, Tuscaloosa Academy 46
Darryl Lee scored 17 points and Austin Cross added 12 as the defending state champs held off Tuscaloosa Academy 49-46 to advance to the AAA finals on Monday against Morgan at 7 p.m.
The Patriots jumped out to a 16-3 lead in the first quarter and controlled the game, but couldn’t pull away from the pesky Knights, who trimmed the deficit to nine points (31-22) at the half and six points (43-37) heading into the final period.
Landon Stell led Tuscaloosa (17-5) with 15 points, followed by Carson Claytor with 11 and Wilson King with 10.
CLASS AAA GIRLS SEMIS
Glenwood School 46, Fort Dale Academy 42
Jasmyn Burts had 16 points and Anna Grace Griggs added 15 as the Gators jumped out to an early lead and then withstood a Fort Dale rally that tied the game at the end of the third quarter.
Anna Claire Thomas led Fort Dale with 17 points, followed by Cahley Acreman with 11.
Glenwood will face Tuscaloosa Academy for the AAA state championship on Monday at 5 p.m.
Tuscaloosa Academy 57, Clarke Prep School 46
Alex Brownlee scored 20 points to lead the Knights into the AAA finals after a wild fourth quarter that saw the Knights and the Gators combine for 42 points in the AAA semifinals on Saturday morning.
Tuscaloosa led 28-22 at the half before the two teams fought through a sluggish third quarter, combining for 11 points, then erupted in the final eight minutes.
Rachel Harris added 16 points for Tuscaloosa, followed by Hill Warr with 10 and Carly King with nine.
Grace Davis led Clarke Prep with 30 points.