LFO boys fall to Hart County in opening round in state tourney

After reaching the state tournament for the first time in 17 years, the Region 6 champion LFO Warriors received a very tough draw in the first round as stateranked Hart County arrived in Fort Oglethorpe on Saturday, Feb. 15 as the No. 4 seed from Region 8 after suffering a pair of upset losses in their region tournament.

The Bulldogs trailed 11-9 at the end of the first quarter on Saturday, but pulled ahead 21-16 at halftime before blowing the game open in the third quarter to post a 53-31 victory and advance to the second round.

Hart County outscored LFO in the decisive third period, 17-4, to end a magical season for the Red-andWhite at 23-5.

Jacob King had eight points to pace the Warriors, followed by Jamichael Davis and Brent Bowman with seven each. Zac Coots had four points. Cameron Gregg added three and James Beddington scored two.

“At the beginning of the season, the team came up with the goals of going to state and winning region,” head coach Josh Laney said. “We accomplished both of those goals and this group of young men will go down as one of the greatest teams in LFO basketball history, which is really something special.

“Obviously we would have loved the season to go on, but overall I am really proud of the team and the season we had. I think that this team has really set up what we hope the future of our program will continue to be for years to come and I can’t thank them enough for that. I really enjoyed being around these players and our seniors will be sorely missed, but will always be Warriors for life.”

LFO’s loss added to what was a very tough opening round for teams from 6-AAA.

North Murray was edged out at home by Monroe Area, 49-47. Jefferson handled Adairsville, 75- 48, and Franklin County slipped past Calhoun, 65-63. Murray County, who got into the state tournament as an atlarge team, was handed a 7956 setback by state-ranked Windsor Forest.