Goose Creek Boys Advance To Lower State Finals At Florence Civic Center With 71-66 OT Win Over Irmo

By Billy G. Baker

Publisher 

Goose Creek—Goose Creek, the HSSR’s top ranked Div. II AAAAA boys’ basketball team, built a 32-20 lead, then withstood a rally by Irmo in the second half to eventually win the over-time game 71-66 at home Monday night. 

With the win Goose Creek advances to challenge Westwood, a 60-57 winner over St. James Monday for the lower state title at the Florence Civic Center this Friday. 



After the big win, Goose Creek head coach Blake Hall shared some of his thoughts: “Really disappointed about the way we played in the second half, after having a nice half-time, lead and I felt like we relaxed a little although we expected them to make a run,” said Coach Hall. “We let them get going and once that snowball starts to roll it is hard to stop at times.

“We just need to do a better job playing with poise and our guys have to do a better job meeting passes and taking better care of the ball,” said Coach Hall. “I think we will correct that and we have a lot of veteran guys know how to step up. But you must win the close ones. And it has been my experiences that the third-round games have been the toughest ones of the whole tournament.” 

Coach Hall about the leadership and the 18- point contribution of senior leader Jaquell Brown. “He has been stepping up and playing well in big games for us all four years of his varsity career,” said Coach Hall. “He has played in two state finals already. He plays with poise and is he is out go to guy.”

Irmo head coach Alex Quillen has now completed his second year as the head coach of the Yellow Jackets after taking over for Hall of Fame coach Tim Whipple two years ago. “We probably should have started putting more pressure on them earlier,” said Coach Quillen. “We have been a second half team all year. We only have one senior (Derrick Thompson) on the team along with a strong group of juniors led by ChristianBrown, and a couple sophomores along with freshmen Khiry White.

“We’ll be back strong next year,” said Coach Quillen. “We have confidence in Christian as a scorer, and he is a heck of a player for us. He does not miss many shots. 

“When I got the job, it was two years after we won a state championship and I came in with a three-year plan,” said Coach Quillen. “Our first goal was to get back where we needed to be, and we won 16 games last year. We competed for a region down to the wire in year two and won 18 games this season. Next year our goal will be to be it all together and win a state championship.”   

Goose Creek built a 12=point lead at the break behind the stellar play of four-year senior starter Ja’Quell Brown who had 11 points at the break along with teammates Brandon Grant and Idreyiss Heist who each had six points. 

However, the game was a tale of two halves, plus one overtime. Irmo junior guard Christian Brown rallied the Jackets finishing with a game high 25 points, bombing in several three pointers from NBA range during the rally. 

It was Brown’s three straight made free throws at the end of regulation that tied the game at 61each after he was fouled attempting to shoot a three, with his team down three, with 5.2 seconds left. 

Irmo, down 12 to start the third period out-scored Goose Creek, and some of the Gators sloppy ballhandling, to cut the deficit to 43-40 to start the final period. Brown scored 9 of his team’s 20 points in the period highlighted by two NBA range three pointers. The Jackets outscored Goose Creek 20-11 in the third period. 

Goose Creek scored the first six points of the final period to take a 49-40 lead. Senior Wing Terrell Johnson, Jr. scored on a put-back, Brown made two free throws, and Hoist scored on a put-back to give the Gators a 9- point lead with 6:20 left in the game. 

Kaleb Copeland scored Irmo’s first points of the final period when he made two free-throws at the 4:54 mark to cut the deficit to 49-42. 

The game was played at times like a track meet, and often the speed of the players colliding into each other, forced a meeting of all three officials who honestly could not agree on which player had committed the foul as they both fell to the floor.  When this happened, they simply used the possession arrow to determine who gained control of the ball, right or wrong. 

With the Gators leading 55-48 with 3:06 left in regulation Iro took advantage of several Gator turnovers to force overtime with a 13-6 run over the next three minutes. Copeland scored on a put-back with 2:53 left and then 6-3 big man Oshon Browman scored on a put-back to cut the deficit to 55-48 with 2:12 left in regulation. Then after Irmo stole an inbounds pass Browman charged in for a lay-up to make the score 55-50 with 2:12 remaining.

With 2:04 left Browman made one-of-two free throws to cut the Gator lead to 55-51. 

With 1:34 left, Brandon Grant scored a huge three pointer from the left elbow to put the Gators up 58-51. 

The final 1:34 of the game Irmo outscored the Gators 10-3 to force overtime with Brown’s three free throws the key to the run. 

In the four-minute overtime, Goose Creek won the tip, and the ball went to Brown he raced to the basket undefended to give the Gators a 63-61 lead. 

However, Irmo’s Brown nailed a three pointer on Irmo’s first possession to put the Jackets up for the final time at 64-63 with 3:28 left. 

Over the rest of the overtime GC out-scored Irmo 7-3 led by a free throw from Grant that tied the game at 64 with 3:17 left in the game. Hoist scored on a put-back with 2:41 left to give GC the lead for good at 66-64. With 2:16 remaining Hoist cammed two free-throws to make it a 68-66 lead and Grant made two free throws to put GC up 70-66 with 26 seconds left. The final point of the game was scored by Jabari Deas, Jr with 2.5 seconds left to seal the win for the Gators. 

Behind Brown’s 18 points, Goose Creek was also led by Hoist (13). Grant (12), Deas (12), along with Jarvis Roper (6), Devonte Williams (6), and Johnson had four points.

Irmo was led by Brown (25), Browman (16), Kaleb Copeland (14) and White (8).