SAND ROCK – It was boys basketball battle worthy of two top-five teams.
In the end, Class 2A, No. 5 Sand Rock had a chance to tie or beat Class 3A, No. 2 Fyffe with a 3-pointer. The Wildcats chose the latter.
With five seconds remaining, Logan Wood tossed an inbound pass to Cade Ballenger from the midcourt stripe. Ballenger took a couple of dribbles and fired off an open 3-pointer that missed the mark, allowing the Red Devils to escape with a 54-52 victory on Friday night.
“When you take two teams who just won their county championships and both are ranked in the top five of their classification, and it comes down to a two-point game, that’s good basketball,” Sand Rock coach John Blackwell said. “It’s fun to be a part of that.
“We had the ball with an opportunity to score in our gym down two. We burned two and they burned two timeouts to get a look. We had a good play drawn up, then we had some malfunction with the clock. When you change everything and you have five seconds to throw it in from a different spot, I know to most people three seconds doesn’t seem like a lot, but that’s an eternity in basketball. I liked the play we had with 8.5 (seconds left) instead of the one we had with five seconds, but I will take my point guard (Ballenger) with an open look from 19 feet away every day and twice on Sunday. That’s all we can ask for, a good look. Cade Ballenger has hit a lot more of those shots than he’s missed.”
Sand Rock (19-5) trailed Fyffe (18-4) in the early stages of the fourth quarter 44-38 before making its comeback attempt.
The Wildcats whittled the Red Devil lead down to a single point three times in the fourth quarter, with the last at 53-52 following a pair of Jacob St. Clair free throws with 46.2 seconds remaining.
Sand Rock’s Garyn Sharpe was called for a foul on Fyffe’s Tyler Stephens with nine seconds to go, sending him to the line for two shots. Stephens sank the first but couldn’t connect on the second, which was rebounded by the Wildcats’ Kaden Justice. Blackwell immediately took a timeout, followed by a Fyffe timeout.
Wood then inbounded the ball to Ballenger from the Red Devil bench, but the clock didn’t start when it was put in play. The referees determined there would be five seconds on the clock with the Wildcats now inbounding from midcourt.
Wood once again inbounded the ball to Ballenger, but his shot fell short as the clock ran out.
“According to the scoreboard, a lot of people might not think we were successful, but (former UCLA basketball coach) John Wooden said one time you can outscore people and lose a game, and you can get outscored and win a game. That’s what happened to us,” Blackwell said. “We might’ve got outscored by two points, but we just won a ball game.
“That’s the second-ranked team in 3A. They just won the DeKalb County Tournament. They’ve beaten Plainview twice. They’re beating everybody. I told our guys when you can play a team like that, then you can play with anybody in the state in 2A. I like what that game did for us.”
Fyffe led 15-11 at the end of the first quarter. The two teams were tied at 31 at halftime following a St. Clair buzzer-beating layup. The Red Devils held a 42-38 edge heading into the fourth quarter.
St. Clair led Sand Rock with 22 points, including a 6-for-6 performance from the free-throw line. Sharpe scored 19 points. Ballenger finished with four points and eight assists.
Six-foot-4 senior post player Brody Dalton delivered 20 points and 12 rebounds to lead the Red Devils. Parker Goodwin added 11 points. Xavier Works netted 10 points. Tate Goolsby connected on a pair of treys and finished with seven points.
Girls
Fyffe 49, Sand Rock 36
SAND ROCK – The Sand Rock Lady Wildcats shot less than 24 percent from the floor against Fyffe and fell by the final of 49-36 in girls basketball action on Friday night.
Lanie Henderson led Sand Rock (14-11) with 13 points, including three 3-pointers. She also had seven rebounds, six blocks and an assist, but no other Lady Wildcat player reached double figures.
“I didn’t feel like we got into any kind of rhythm. They out-played us with energy from the get-go,” Sand Rock coach Lisa Bates said. “We’re not going to beat anybody shooting 13-of-55. I felt like we got plenty of shots. We had 25 3-pointers that were not forced. They were open 3-pointers and we only hit five. We’re not going to beat anybody that way.”
Despite Sand Rock’s shooting woes, the Lady Wildcats were tied with Fyffe at 29 with less than six minutes to go following a Henderson trey.
Another Henderson 3-pointer at the 4:11 mark of the fourth kept it a two-point game in favor of Fyffe. But a 7-0 mini Red Devil run in less than a minute, capped by a 3-pointer from Alexia Barber, pushed Fyffe’s lead to 41-32 with less than three minutes to go.
The deficit proved too much for the Lady Wildcats to overcome.
“That was the dagger (Barber’s 3-pointer),” Bates said. “We knew she could shoot. She’s the one who killed us two years ago at JSU.
“We were tied up, but they wanted it more. We don’t have that push power or that fire to get that one stop when the game’s tied or we’re even down two. We’re not buckling down on defense when we need to. It’s been a struggle continuously.”
Fyffe built a 17-10 first-quarter lead and held a 27-21 advantage at halftime. Sand Rock cut its deficit to 29-26 after three quarters.
Emma Twilley led Fyffe with 18 points. Alyssa Webb tossed in 15 points, and Barber finished with seven points.
Katelyn St. Clair and Haley Grace Lisenbee both contributed six points and four rebounds for Sand Rock. Lisenbee also had five assists and a pair of steals. Maci Brown finished with five points, 12 rebounds, two steals and an assist.
