ROANOKE — For the first eight minutes of Monday night’s playoff contest, the Patrick Henry-Roanoke hit its shots and played tight defense, roaring out to a 10-point lead as any three-seed likely would do against a six-seed.
But the switch flipped. Mills Godwin started to get the shots to fall, and its defense held firm. Only this time, it lasted longer than one period.
The No. 6 Eagles outscored the No. 3 Patriots 59-32 in the final three quarters to pull off a 62-45 upset in the Region 5C quarterfinals.
“They’ve got a great shooting team, and I thought the first quarter we stayed disciplined on defense, 100%,” PH-Roanoke coach Jack Esworthy said. “Their kickouts, they didn’t have any room to shoot. And then second quarter we just over-helped, we lost our man, and we let them get back into it.”
Godwin will play at No. 1 Albemarle (21-3) in the 5C semifinals Wednesday. The Eagles handed the Patriots one of their three losses back on Dec. 27 with a 66-65 victory.
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“Just one possession at a time. It’s pretty cliche, but that’s what we did,” Godwin coach Jake Oliver said. “We got some stops and started getting better movement on offense, the ball started getting shared around a little bit, and then guys just made some shots that we didn’t get in that first quarter.”
Lincoln Hundley, Daniel Keogh and Colby Campbell, all of whom were held scoreless in the first quarter, finished in double figures for Mills Godwin (16-7). Hundley scored a game-high 22 points, including 16 in the second half, while Keogh added 13 points and Campbell chipped in 11.
“I’m glad we kicked it into gear, because it was looking a little rough there in that first quarter.” Oliver said. “But the boys made the stops and started hitting some shots.”
Leron Lipford was the only player to reach double figures for PH-Roanoke (16-6), finishing with 20 points. Marcus Pannell was next with eight points. Tay’marion Stanley spent the majority of the game hobbled after injuring his left foot less than halfway through the opening quarter. He spent the rest of the evening either on the sideline or limping on the floor, tallying just two points.
Five different players scored for PH as it built a 13-3 lead with two minutes to play in the first. It then failed to score another point for almost seven minutes as Godwin stormed back, tying the game on a Campbell 3-pointer with 4:13 to play in the second quarter.
The teams went back and forth until Campbell drilled another 3, this time a go-ahead jumper to give the Eagles a 22-20 lead. The Patriots never recovered.
“First quarter, we were locked in. I don’t know if we looked up, 13-3, and we thought it was going to be easy,” Esworthy said. “Undisciplined against a good team, you’re going to lose.”
Godwin outscored PH 21-8 in the second quarter. The Patriots stayed in contention in the third, falling behind by seven but getting back two, but the Eagles stayed in front and stretched their lead to 11 more than halfway through the fourth.
“I thought we panicked a little bit in the second half,” Esworthy said. “We’re looking up down six, seven, just feeling the pressure of a win-or-go-home game, I thought, and then we didn’t execute on the offensive end.”
