Mills Godwin boys basketball's run comes to end at Albemarle in Region 5C semifinal

For the Mills Godwin Eagles, though, try wasn’t enough.

All the hustle, resilience, and spirit they could muster in their Region 5C semifinal basketball game Wednesday night against top-seeded Albemarle weren’t enough.

The leave-it-all-on-the-court mindset with which they competed, even when the outcome had been long decided, wasn’t enough either.

The Patriots (21-3) were just too quick, too athletic, too aggressive and too relentless.

Dominating from beginning to end, they scored a 68-42 victory, a home date Friday with L.C. Bird in the regional championship game, and a berth in the Class 5 state tournament, which begins next week.

“We knew they were explosive,” said Godwin coach Jake Oliver, whose team, the No. 5 seed, finished 16-8. “They’re the one-seed for a reason. They know how to win games. They’re big, they’re physical, they’re fast, and we dug ourselves a hole.

“We tried to play one possession at a time, get a stop and claw our way back in there. We had some opportunities, but they found that second gear and opened it back up again.”

Facing no-holds-barred man-to-man pressure, the Eagles managed well early on and led 7-6 three minutes into the game.

With MarJaylen Jackson, a powerful 6-6 junior, leading the way, the Patriots finished the quarter with a 10-0 run to take a 16-7 lead into the second.

As they established superiority during the first eight minutes, they shot 6-for-11, forced four turnovers, and outrebounded the visitors 9-0 and never looked back.

“I was really pleased with our defense,” Albemarle coach Greg Maynard said. “We were getting our hands on a lot of passes and dribbles, and all five of our guys were playing great team defense.

“As hard-nosed as Godwin is and the way they pack it in (on defense), it’s tough to get easy shots, so if you miss a bad shot, you have to make sure you get some rebounds. We wanted to get offensive rebounds and dominate them on defense.”

Though stifled offensively, the Eagles hounded Albemarle with their own well-executed man-to-man, but after Daniel Keogh’s 3-pointer at 4:27 cut the difference to 18-10, the Patriots outscored Godwin 11-2 to take a 29-12 lead into the break.

“We came out understanding the stakes of this game,” said Jackson, who scored 11 of his 22 points in the first quarter. “In this tournament, it’s win or go home. We’ve worked hard and pushed each other, and we came out here with a dog-eat-dog mindset and did what we had to do.”

Though trailing significantly, the Eagles returned in the second half with focus and energy and used a variety of trapping, zone defensive schemes, basically everything in their arsenal, but to little avail.

“The first half, we did OK defensively trying to get it into a halfcourt game, but we struggled with rebounding, and they got second and third opportunities,” Oliver said. “The second half, we needed a change and took some gambles, some risks to try to change the pace of the game. They’re well coached. They knew where to go with the basketball.”

“We knew we had our hands full. We believed we could come out and make something happen. Unfortunately, tonight just wasn’t the night.”

The third quarter ended with Albemarle ahead 48-28.

In the first 1:30 of the fourth, Keogh (17 points) drew a foul driving to the hoop and hit two free throws, and Colby Campbell’s putback enabled the Eagles to close to 48-32.

They sensed an opening. There was hope, they thought, but it was short lived.

Unfazed by the possibility that the Eagles might scrap and claw back into the game, the Patriots outscored them 20-10 the rest of the way to seal the deal.

“Tonight, the pressure got to us,” Keogh said. “They pushed us out. We couldn’t get to the rim. Turnovers and rebounds are where they got us.”

That said …

“Everybody wanted to win,” Keogh added. “Everybody thought we were going to win. The best thing about this group is that we never gave up. Every game we’ve played, no matter what was in front of us, we were going to fight to win.”

Albemarle shot 24-for-45, scored 32 points from the paint, forced 12 turnovers, committed 10, and outrebounded the Eagles 38-19.

The loss stings. That’s for sure. The moment will pass, though, and time will heal.

“I told the boys that the hardest thing to do is address the locker room after a game like this, “Oliver said. “We’ve put so much into the season. The boys have been unbelievable. Everything we’ve asked them to do, there’s been total buy-in.

“We did some good things tonight, but the bounces didn’t go our way tonight. It’s nothing to hold our heads down. They’ll look back, maybe not today or tomorrow, and realize that there’s a ton to be proud of this season.”