Warriors back in action this week
The Gordon Central High School basketball team is now off until after the New Year.
And the break probably comes at a good time for a team that will try to regroup and put things back together when the 2022 part of their schedule resumes Tuesday, Jan. 4 with their AA Region 7 schedule and a road trip to Pepperell.
The Warriors completed play Wednesday night in the Mistletoe Madness tournament at North Murray High School and now have a full week to back in the gym and get to work on being the best team they can be in January and February, when playoff positions from each seed are determined.
The team lost all three games they played at Murray, but still have a lot to play for this winter with the rest of the region schedule in front of them.
“We’ve just got to keep working,” Gordon Central first-year head coach Wes Greer said. “The kids know we’re trying to change the culture in this program and the way you do that is too keep working. And if you keep working you’re only going to get better, so the key for us is too keep working. But
I have no doubt that if we can just start to experience some success and have some things go our way, we’ll get this turned around.”
At the North Murray event, all three games weren’t really close and Greer said that is a trend they’ve got to curtail now.
“We’ve got to stay competitive,” he said. “Whatever we have to do to give ourselves a chance to stay competitive, that’s what we have to do. Right now, at times, we’re struggling to do that, but we have to do whatever we have to do to stay competitive.”
He said he believes they have a set starting five and feels good about the people coming off the bench behind them, but nothing is secure and players need to maintain their level of play or changes could be coming.
The began play in the North Murray competition by falling to the hosts, 52-29, on the first day and then they lost to Ringgold, 71-33, on the second before they were knocked off by Murray County Monday in what is to be their final game for nearly two weeks until they square off with Pepperell again.
Nothing has changed in the early AA Region 7 standings with Chattooga, Dade County, and Coosa all unbeaten with one of Chattooga’s and one of Coosa’s two league wins coming against Gordon Central.
But obviously, everyone still has 10 or 11 Region games remaining and anyone off to a slow start, like Gordon Central, Pepperrell, and others, still has a chance to turn their season around by getting hot when 2022 arrives. Basically, anybody who comes out in the New Year and can run the table, will not only make the playoffs, but will be a contender for a region championship and the top seed heading into the playoffs
And Greer talked before the season tipped off that the Warriors wanted to be at their best come January and February, so the Warriors still have a chance to do exactly that.
And with some solid practice time in the gym, they are hoping to do exactly that — heat up in January when it matters the most.
Besides their good starts in Region play, Chattooga, Coosa, Dade County and Model — which also has a region win and is 1-1 — also have the best records overall in the region at this point.
Model went into Christmas with the most wins among the Region 7 clubs with a 6-2 record while Coosa had one less victory and was 5-2. Dade County is 5-3 overall with Chattooga sitting 5-4. The other three teams are below .500 and Pepperell began this week at 0-8 and may still be looking for their first win of the season when the Dragons and Warriors face off in less than two weeks in Rome.