Disastrous first quarter buries Houston County in Elite Eight loss to Woodward Academy

COLLEGE PARK, Ga. — If you take away the first quarter of Wednesday’s Elite Eight matchup between Houston County and Woodward Academy you get a competitive game decided by less than 10 points.

Unfortunately for the Bears, a disastrous first quarter saw them down 28-3 in an eventual 80-48 final. The remaining three were much better, but by then it was much too late.

“We thought after the first quarter we got good looks at the rim,” HoCo head coach Buddy Bivins said. “[We] missed a few layups off the rim, kind of get sped up a little bit [in the first quarter]. But hats off to [Woodward Academy] they started off fast, they were hitting shots.”

“We knew it would be a tough matchup problem so going zone kind of was the only way we could start out. They got in a rhythm and once they got in a rhythm we were playing from behind. It was hard to get ourselves out of that hole.”

In the first minute of the game the War Eagles out-rebounded the Mahkel Stephens and Braylin Mills lineup and won the transition battle decisively.

After 60 seconds HoCo was down 7-0, 30 more it was a 9-0 deficit.

The Bears didn’t score their first (and only) points of the quarter until Malik Gillespie walked into a three-pointer at the top of the arc with 1:17 left in the period. Before then it was a 22-0 Woodward Academy run, and after that they scored five more points before taking a 28-3 lead into the second.

In those eight minutes the War Eagles just did everything better than HoCo. They defended better, rebounded better, got out in transition better, finished at the basket better.

The Bears visibly felt the ball pressure and many fumbled passes. Gillespie and Josh Jackson had a hard time getting their usual looks and when they did they were smothered.

The Stephens and Mills lineup wasn’t a success, either, and Bivins abandoned the two-big lineups in the second quarter. He did, however, return to them in different combinations throughout the second half.

“We were trying to match their size. They’re long,” Bivins said. “We knew they were going to play a lot from the perimeter so we were trying to counter by playing inside. But they did a good job of speeding the game up, not allowing us to get there.”

Josh Pettigrew both as a solo big and paired with Stephens in the last two quarters were much better, specifically defending transition. Woodward Academy was relentless pushing the ball out and they almost always had at least one player leak to the other side of the court before the rebound even came down.

Pettigrew is the most mobile of the three centers, so he was at least able to act as a big body in that half of the floor.

Eventually the offense picked up a bit, too, though they never truly seemed to find a rhythm.

This was brand new territory for Bivins and his team. The last time the Bears made it this far was more than 20 years ago, in 2003, so it might as well have been the first time for anyone attached to this run.

Under Bivins the Bears have improved every year and brought the program to relevancy in middle Georgia. There’s a lot he, and his returning players, can learn from a tough experience in a hostile gym.

“Now we see what it takes to get to the Final Four and be a state champion. You’re going to start seeing players you’ve never seen before, which is why I try to do a good job of scheduling tougher games against tough matchups to where we’re not brand new to them,” Bivins said. “[Woodward Academy] just had four people on the floor that it was hard to match…We had a great season and I’m proud of the boys, how they kept competing even when it was bad.”

UP NEXT

Woodward will advance to the Final Four and play at Georgia State University on March 6.

Houston County finishes their best season under Bivins: A region championship, most wins in a season in the MaxPreps era (23, breaking their record last year) and an Elite Eight appearance, also a first in the MaxPreps era and only one of two in the last 23 years.

Congratulations to coach Bivins and the Bears for an outstanding season!