By Joe Medley, East Alabama Sports Today
JACKSONVILLE — Piedmont’s deepest run in girls’ basketball in 17 years won the Bulldogs an opportunity. It also brought nerves.
Amiyah Thomas led Piedmont with 15 points, but offensive struggles doomed Piedmont’s girls in a 52-36 loss to Sylvania in Tuesday’s Class 3A Northeast Regional finals in Pete Mathews Coliseum.
Sylvania (18-14) advanced to next week’s Final Four in Birmingham.
Piedmont finished (16-14) after a season that saw the Bulldogs reach the regional final for the first time since 2008.
The Bulldogs shot 12-for-33 from the floor (36.4 percent) and got off 23 fewer shots than Sylvania took. The Rams forced 27 Piedmont turnovers.
“That’s 100 percent the difference,” Piedmont coach Shane Morrow said. “Give them a lot of credit. We knew it was coming. We knew what they were going to do. You just have to give them credit. They played really, really hard.
“Turnovers are not uncharacteristic for us. I hate to say that, but I thought the type of turnovers today were really bad. … We did some stuff today that was very uncharacteristic. I thought we played nervous early on.”
Tournament MVP Avery Jenkins scored a game-high 18 points, and all-tournament pick Sarah Graham pulled down 14 rebounds. Joining them on the all-tournament team were Sylvania’s Meredith Jackson, Thomas and Cayla Brothers from Piedmont and Whitesburg Christian’s Savannah Bookout.
So ends the line for Piedmont after the Bulldogs earned the right to play host to the Class 3A, Area 12 tournament, won the tournament and won a subregional game against Randolph County.
The Bulldogs beat Whitesburg Christian in the regional semifinals to reach their first regional final since 2008.
“It was a huge accomplishment,” Brothers said. “We had a lot of people that didn’t think that we could make it this far. We were really not even supposed to make it out of area, to most people, in their opinion.
“To make it this far, to the ‘Elite Eight,’ I feel that says a lot about our team and about how tough we are to be able to still go with the target on our backs, with Glencoe and Westbrook (Christian) and everybody in our area. Nobody really believed in us except for us.”
Morrow said the Bulldogs have come “light years” in two years.
“From where we were, the seniors two years ago, to where we’re at, we’re light years ahead,” he said. “I really enjoyed coaching this team, because the one thing they did to the end was playing hard,
“To be honest with you, they probably overachieved and got everything out of their bodies they could. If people knew how sick we were going into the Randolph County game. We probably only had three 100 percent healthy players that first round of the playoffs. … They just gutted it out.”
