Down one with 11 seconds left, South Atlanta coach Michael Reddick called timeout.
His team had seen a 12-point lead over Tri-Cities evaporate, after star senior point guard Derrick Byrd fouled out in a holiday tournament game Monday at Centennial High School.
Reddick says he has about 10 go-to plays that he can pull out off the top of his head in last-shot situations. Against Tri-Cities, Reddick drew up a play to get his other star senior guard, Costa Anderson, the ball on the wing.
“We set a double screen for our other guard to come and get the ball,” Reddick explained. “He zigged through so that they wouldn’t switch. When he got the ball up top, we set a staggered a double screen for Costa, after he threw the ball inbounds. If they (defenders) were going to trail it, he was going to curl. If they didn’t trail them and got caught in the screen, we were going to give it to them. But, if they switched out, we were going to look inside for the big guy.”
Option No. 2, freshman big-man Tyler Thorton, ended up wide open and hit the winning layup as time expired.
“Sometimes those plays were perfectly,” said Reddick. “Others times, they don’t.”
It was the fourth-ranked Hornets’ sixth straight win and sends them into a crucial stretch in the Region 6-AAAA schedule with momentum. South Atlanta (13-4, 4-0) is at Marist (7-10, 4-4) on Tuesday, followed by a huge home game Thursday against first-place and top-ranked Columbia (13-1, 5-0).
Big game: No. 2 Fayette County hosts No. 7 Alexander on Tuesday in a battle of the two top teams in Region 5-AAAA. Alexander (13-3, 6-0) has won nine straight games. Fayette County (12-4, 4-1) is trying to rebound from back-to-back non-region losses.
Updated AJC AAAA Rankings
Boys
- Columbia
- Fayette County
- Eagle's Landing
- South Atlanta
- Rutland
- Glenn Hills
- Alexander
- Liberty County
- Sandy Creek
- Westover
Girls
- Redan
- Columbus
- Cross Creek
- Carrollton
- Monroe
- Columbia
- Woodland-Stockbridge
- Chestatee
- Mary Persons
- Rutland
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