Brewer sweeps Hartselle
By Staff
Todd Thompson, Hartselle Enquirer
Sam Brown would have really enjoyed watching his Brewer Patriots cruise to the Class 5A, Area 13 regular season championship with a rout of rival Hartselle Friday night.
The Brewer coach won’t complain much after the Patriots held off a late challenge by the Tigers to claim a 49-48 win on the road.
Hartselle scored 29 points in the fourth quarter after having just nine points total in the first half.
The Tigers shot (18 of 51 fr4om the field in the game, but made 14 of 29 in the second half as Hartselle rallied to close the final margin to one point.
Brewer dominated the game early, opening up a 17-7 advantage in the first quarter.
The Patriots extended the lead to 30-9 at the end of the first half as Hartselle struggled to get any offense going against Brewer’s swarming defense.
The Patriots didn’t have a single player in double figures in the win, but used a balanced scoring attack to pick up the win. Brandon Murray led the Patriots with nine points, while Kohl Sowder and Darrius Campbell both finished with eight points.
Murray was 3-for-3 from the 3-point line in the win.
Eight of Brewer’s 10 players scored in the win.
Hartselle’s Rodney Stansberry scored 14 points in the loss, while Manquez Jones finished with 11 points. The Tigers also got nine points from Marquez Jones, who made four of his seven shots.
Sowder hit a 3-pointer with 44 seconds left in the game to give Brewer a five-point advantage, but a bucket from Stansberry and a 3-pointer from Manquez Jones made it 45-43 with a little over a minute left in the game.
Hartselle tied the game when Alex Brown hit a 3-pointer with just 22 seconds remaining in the game, but the Tigers couldn’t hold off Brewer.
Houston Lanford drove in for a layup in the closing seconds and made one of his free throws to secure the win.
Brewer 58, Hartselle 55
The ninth-ranked Lady Patriots held off a late challenge from Hartselle to wrap up the Class 5A, Area 13 regular-season championship.
Brewer improved to 16-2 overall with the win. The Lady Patriots are 5-0 in area play.
Meagan Hormel led Brewer with 17 points with 10 rebounds. Emily Dabbs and Kendra Jones finished with 13 and 12 points respectively.
Hartselle’s Jessi Smith led all scorers with 19 points after hitting seven of her 15 points.
Anna Reeves added 12 points with four 3-pointers, while Alex Holmes had nine points.
Reeves hit two consecutive 3-pointers midway through the final quarter to help the Tigers tie the game at 48-48.
But the Lady Tigers quickly fell behind by eight points after Brewer went on an 8-0 run that was highlighted by buckets from Dabbs, Chelsey Smith and Jones.
Hartselle fell to 10-9 overall with the loss, but head coach Greg Adams was more than pleased with the Lady Tigers’ effort. After struggling for several weeks, Adams watched his team put together one of its best performances of the year.
Adams’ team scrimmaged against the Hartselle freshmen earlier in the week and the practice seemed to help the Lady Tigers get back to their standard style of play.
