The Elbert County Lady Devils are Final 4 bound.
No. 12 seed Elbert went on the road and beat No. 4 seed Vidalia 61-38, advancing to the GHSA A state championship semifinal and avenging last year’s playoff loss to the Indians in the process.
“It’s surreal right now,” head coach Josh Jones said. “I felt like we could come out and frustrate them. I thought we did that… I’m so proud of our girls tonight.”
The Lady Devils indeed caused plenty of frustration for Vidalia from the opening tip. They threw a flurry of different full-court zone presses at the Indians, who struggled to adjust throughout the game as Elbert continuously switched up its defensive looks.
“We feel like if we can get the ball out of their hands and make them make passes, eventually it's gonna wear on and we can turn them over,” Jones said. “That's what we like to do.”
Elbert led 14-6 after the first quarter, spurred by a couple of early 3-pointers from senior Kaylen Rucker and junior Aaliyah Allen.
Rucker hit another shot from behind the arc to make it a 21-7 lead in the second quarter, but Vidalia got a run going and cut the deficit down to six points by the end of the half, with Elbert up 26-20.
“We kind of got in our feelings a little bit there in the second quarter, but I thought we'd come back out in the second half and really establish ourselves and put the game away,” Jones said.
That’s exactly what happened. Though Vidalia cut it to a four-point Elbert lead in the middle of the second quarter, back-to-back 3-pointers from Allen and Rucker again got the Lady Devils back up by double digits.
Elbert punctuated its rally-crushing third quarter with a buzzer-beating putback from freshman Bryleigh Dickerson that made it a 44-30 Lady Devil lead entering the fourth quarter.
The Lady Devils continued their smothering press in the final period of play, and threw out a 1-2-2 trap defense that they hadn’t shown Vidalia much earlier in the game. There were countless times where Lady Devils zoomed into passing lanes and stole the ball to set up easy baskets on the other end.
Elbert wound up with a decisive 23-point victory. Allen led the team in scoring with 19 points, followed by Lunsford with 11. Rucker scored nine points on three made 3-pointers, and point guard Tiyah Turman added seven. Elbert willingly attacked the lane all night and dished out well-timed passes to the perimeter for 3-point looks.
Now, the Lady Devils will head to Fort Valley State University to take on Putnam County in the Final 4.
The War Eagles went 21-2 this season. One of their two losses was to Lamar County in the Region 4A Division I championship, a team that Elbert defeated in the Sweet 16 last week. Their only other common opponent this year was 8-18 Social Circle, whom both teams beat.
Putnam’s backcourt of junior Journey Waller and freshman Jaydah Baker lead the team in scoring with 11.8 and 11.6 points per game respectively, and Waller has been a disruptive defender with 3.2 steals per game. The War Eagles are coached by fourth-year head coach Derrick Arrington.
A trip to Macon Coliseum for the March 13 state championship will be on the line Saturday in Fort Valley. The game will tip off at 1 p.m., with digital tickets available on GoFan.