Greater Atlanta Christian survived an ice-cold third quarter and held off a Beach rally in the final minutes to beat the defending state champion 55-45 in the Class AAA girls basketball quarterfinals Tuesday in Norcross.
The victory helped the No. 1-ranked Spartans (24-4) avenge an overtime loss to Beach in the semifinals last season. In that game, an apparent scorekeeping error cost GAC a point that would’ve given the Spartans the victory in regulation.
GAC will play second-ranked Franklin County in the semifinals at 2 p.m. Saturday at Georgia Southern University-Armstrong Campus (formerly Armstrong State). The Lions (30-0), one of only two undefeated girls teams in the state, advanced to the semifinals with a 55-44 victory Tuesday against No. 9 Peach County.
“Of course. I’m not even going to try to fake it. Of course,” GAC coach Lady Grooms said when asked if last year’s result provided extra motivation this year. “If you go in our locker room, it says ‘Redemption.’ I put that up in October. I needed them to be able to understand that that’s what we’re fighting for this year. Who would’ve thought that redemption would’ve been against the same team. We didn’t know that. It was just redemption like, ‘Let’s take on this year.’ But we played the same team. … We should’ve won last year. Forget the one point, all that silly stuff. That didn’t make or break us, we just didn’t play well.”
The Spartans made sure there was no doubt this time. They scored the first five points of the game, eventually built the lead to 13 points and never trailed in the game, but they still needed some key plays from MaryMartha Turner down the stretch to put it away. She scored 10 of her 14 points in the fourth quarter and was 5-of-6 from the free-throw line in the final 1:15 after Beach had rallied to within three points.
“MaryMartha made some crucial blocked shots and got some crucial rebounds, and then when they fouled, it was icing on the cake when you make the free throws,” Grooms said. “In that last minute, MaryMartha said, ‘Hey, you’re not going to take this game.’ And you’ve got to have that. We can say everything as coaches, but you’ve got to have players that say they’re taking ownership. … I just think that in the last minutes or seconds, you’ve got to have somebody that stepped. MaryMartha stepped.”
GAC had a 29-20 advantage at halftime and was able to preserve most of that lead through the third quarter despite making just one field goal, a 3-pointer by Taylor Sutton with three minutes to play in the quarter. Beach outscored GAC 9-7 in the quarter and trailed 37-29 heading to the fourth.
Third-ranked Beach (27-3) continued to chip away at the Spartans’ lead, and a 3-pointer by Madison Evans pulled the Bulldogs within 48-45 with 1:43 remaining. A GAC turnover on its next possession gave Beach a chance to possibly tie the game, but Turner blocked a shot and the Bulldogs didn’t score again. Turner’s five free throws and two by Caria Reynolds provided the final margin.
Evans and Jabrekia Bass kept Beach in the game. Bass finished 15 points and Evans had 14, and they combined for 19 of the Bulldogs’ 25 second-half points. Sutton led GAC with 15 points, and Reynolds added 14.
“Honestly, it’s nice to be playing in a game where you’re not winning by 20,” Turner said. “We’re a competitive team, and we want competitive games. It’s like they always say, you want the games that are competitive, you want the games that are hard. I didn’t sleep last night I was so excited.”
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