Britiya Curtis’s 34 send Lady Jackets to Elite 8
♦ Calhoun girls rally from 16-point third quarter deficit to stay alive in 4A state playoffs
The Calhoun High School girls basketball team are in the Elite 8.
With senior guard Britiya Curtis on fire from the outset, the Lady Jackets rallied from a 16-point third quarter deficit Friday night to eliminate Cambridge, 68-63, in a second-round GHSA 4A state playoff game and now head to the quarterfinals this week needing three wins to claim the big prize — a state championship.
“It’s a nice thought,” Calhoun High
School head girls basketball coach Jaime Echols said of a possible 5A title. “But there’s still a lot of basketball to be played and we’ll see where we are after this (next) playoff game. Maybe then we can think about that because we’ll be in the Final Four, but our focus right now is strictly the next team we play. We feel great about where we are, but we’ve still got a lot of work to do.”
The win Friday night put them in the third round against Arabia Mountain Tuesday night at The Hive with the winner headed to the 4A Final Four this weekend at West Georgia University in Carollton and a berth in the state semifinals.
Arabia Mountain brought a 26-2 record into Tuesday evening’s quarterfinal with Calhoun and the Lady Rams are just 10 points away from being undefeated, losing to Walnut Grove by six points, 64-58, back in November just before Thanksgiving.
They then ran off 21 consecutive victories before losing by four points, 62-58, to Decatur in the Region 4-4A tournament finals to drop to the second seed heading into the playoffs.
The Lady Rams have opened the playoffs with victories over McIntosh in the first round and Jones County last Friday night. They beat McIntosh 65-39 and then eliminated Jones County by a 52-36 count in their Sweet 16 outing. (Details of the Calhoun-Arabia Mountain were not available at press time).