The Newton County Academy basketball teams saw their season come to an end last week.
The Lady Generals fell 50-48 in the semifinals of the Class 2A Division II tournament while the Generals lost 48-35 to Hillcrest Christian.
Hillcrest Christian boys 48, NCA 35
The Generals fell behind early as the Cougars took an early lead and took a 13-point win in semifinal action.
“I felt like at the beginning of the year we could have had a pretty good team,” NCA boys coach Tanner Smith said. “Once I got all the football guys fully healthy around Christmas, we really started to show improvement. We still had some heart breaking loses at the end of the season, but the group came to work every day and just tried to win the next game. Once we got to north state, we played well enough to get a bid to the state tournament and fought very hard against a good Hillcrest team but came up short. I want to thank our only senior Cooper Savell for everything he has done for the program he was a great leader for us this year and lead by example he played extremely hard all year, and he will be greatly missed.”
Hillcrest outscored NCA 13-6 in their first period and 13-7 in the second period to lead 26-13 at the half. NCA fought back and outscored Hillcrest 14-8 in the third to cut the lead to 34-27 going to the fourth. Hillcrest then outscored NCA 14-8 in the fourth to take the win.
Cohen Rule led NCA with 13 points while Ethan Woodham had 12 points.
River Oaks girls 50, NCA 48
The Lady Generals couldn’t hold onto an early lead but battled back in the fourth period to fall short to the Lady Mustangs in the Class 2A Division II semifinals on Tuesday.
“I am very proud of each and every one of these girls and their accomplishments this season,” NCA coach Cory Cleveland said. “They played with a lot of heart and grit. Having a group (team) like this who always tries their best to do what you are asking of them, and leaves everything out there on the court always makes coaching enjoyable.
NCA led 13-8 at the end of the first period before River Oaks outscored the Lady Generals 18-6 in the second to take a 26-19 lead at the half. River Oaks took the third period 11-10 to extend the lead to 37-29 going to the fourth. NCA then outscored River Oaks 19-13 in the fourth to cut the margin to two.
Adriane Luke led NCA with 19 points while Jesslyn Mott had nine points. Maggie Vance had eight points while Jamie Stamper added six points.
