Augusta Christian goes for third straight state title, will face Cardinal Newman again for AAAA crown
ACS beats Heathwood Hall 69-39, Cardinal Newman edges Hammond 51-43
Sumter – The SCISA AAAA boys basketball state championship game will be a rematch of last season.
Two-time defending state champion Augusta Christian School and Cardinal Newman will meet for the state championship on Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Sumter Civic Center after semifinal wins on Wednesday. Augusta Christian routed Heathwood Hall 69-39, while Cardinal Newman held off Hammond 51-43.
“The guys are coming together at the right time,” said ACS head coach Brandon Dotson, whose team improved to 22-7 on the season. “This is really the first time all season we've been healthy. I can recall only four or five games this year where we dressed everybody.
“We've been banged up, we're still banged up. We're about 85 percent healthy. We were just happy to have everyone in a jersey tonight.”
The Lions came out hot, opening a 21-3 lead after one quarter. They led 37-14 at halftime and 58-31 after three quarters.
Dotson said when Augusta Christian is playing solid defense is when it is playing good on offense.
“When we're playing defense, when we're talking, when we're rebounding, we're hard to beat,” Dotson said. “That's our calling card this year, it's defense.
“This is not our most talented team, but it's our best team in a long time from top to bottom.”
Highlanders head coach Brian Benator said falling behind early was about the worst thing that could happen to his young squad.
“They're a team if you let them get ahead of you, playing with that kind of momentum, it makes it really hard on you,” Benator said. "They're a really athletic team and there's a reason they are back-to-back state champions.”
Senior Khaleel Pratt, who has signed to play basketball with Kentucky, led ACS with 20 points. Troy Booker had 17 points, Uzziah Morton had 11, and Aamere Tolbert had nine.
The Highlanders finished with a 9-18 record. They were led in scoring by Deuce Claxton with 10 points. Kaumari Hunter, Chip Ravenell and Henry Morris had six points apiece.
With just one senior on the roster, Benator is excited about Heathwood’s future.
“We start three sophomores and two juniors on a team that made it to the state semifinals,” Benator said. “As painful as this is, we want to build on this. This team has stayed connected throughout the process, so we just want to build on this.”
The Hammond-Cardinal Newman contest was a nip-and-tuck, back-and-forth contest. In the end, the Cardinals took control early in the fourth quarter and went on to the victory.
CN took a 36-34 lead into the fourth quarter. A layup by Josiah Peeples and a free throw apiece from Elton Smith Jr. and Peeples pushed the advantage to 43-36 with 3:56 left in the game.
A 3-pointer by Jaiden Haltiwanger brought the Skyhawks within 43-39 with 3:10 left. However, they couldn’t get any closer as CN limited them to only nine points in the final stanza.
This was the third meeting between the teams with Cardinal Newman winning each of the games.
“When you've got to play a region team, and a team you know very well three times, it typically doesn’t work out for you, but that's what we had to do,” said Cardinals head coach Philip Deter, whose team improved to 18-13. “They're a tough team. They've got good players, good athletes. Toward the end of the game we found a lineup that got hot.”
Freshman Luis Echavarria led CN with 15 points. Amarii King added 14 points, Peeples had nine, and Smith and Evan Carter had five apiece.
Haltiwanger and Mike Tyler had 10 points apiece to lead Hammond, which finished with a 14-9 record. Maki Smith-Brown had nine points, Jackson Ross had eight and Daylin Haltiwanger had six.
They were 8 of 15 from 3(-point range),” Skyhawks head coach David Ross said of CN. “We made maybe two, one of them being from halfcourt (at the end of the first half to give Hammond a 26-24 lead. “So they shot the ball better than we did.
Coach Ross is excited about the future for a very simple reason.
“We don't have any seniors,” Ross said. “We've got this entire group coming back, so hopefully we've established a foundation that will allow us to continue to get better next year to win these types of games.”
Cardinal Newman obviously has one game left against the team it lost to in the championship game.
“They're good, they're healthy, they're going to be ready to play,” Deter said of ACS, with which it split two regular-season games. “ We've got one day to figure it out. We need to be playing our best basketball.”
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