Rockmart teams host first round of playoffs, Sports

The Lady Jackets’ season ends against Rabun County at home.

The Rockmart Yellow Jackets boys basketball team is headed into the second round of the playoffs after pulling off an exciting win to keep their season going, and are set to take a road trip to Columbus for the next round this week.

Unfortunately for the Lady Jackets, their season was cut short and came to a close following a hard loss at home in the first round of the Class AA state tournament.

Rockmart split up their home games last weekend to open the state playoffs, with the Lady Jackets on the court first last Friday hosting Rabun County, who went to the state championship game last year against Laney and found themselves runners-up.

The Lady Jackets ended up falling to the Lady Wildcats in a 73-46 loss to finish the season.

The Lady Wildcats held a 42-16 lead at halftime. Rockmart outscored its opponent 20-16 in the third period, but it wasn’t enough to chip away at the deficit.

Rockmart was led by freshman Keyarah Berry’s 24 points, while Rabun County ( 23- 6) was paced by Georgia Stockton’s 35 points.

With the way the Lady Jackets found themselves finishing the season, head coach Tim Puckett hoped it would spur on his team to push harder to do even better when Fall 2018 comes around.

“This is the first time you realize how young we are,” he said. “But I would rather have a young team that has a bitter defeat like this. We’re returning most everyone, and I think it is going to be an exciting year for us next year, and I think these girls will know what it is like, have the experience to take in and learn from their mistakes..”

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