Lumpkin girls return to dominate form with 25-point playoff win

DAHLONEGA, GEORGIA – For Lumpkin County Girls Basketball head coach David Dowse, the first quarter of Tuesday’s first round playoff game against Oconee County was perhaps their most important test so far this season.

“I told the girls I will know in the first quarter whether we’ve decided that we’re really going to make a run at this thing or not and we are,” Dowse said. "They’re ready to go. They’re excited and having fun and that’s part of it too. The locker room is happy, they’re making fun of me and that’s always a good thing.”

The Indians passed Dowse’s test with flying colors, outscoring the Warriors 14-7 in the first quarter on their way to a 72-47 victory over Oconee to advance to the next round. 

The win comes as an important reset after being shocked in the Region Championship. Tuesday night saw Lumpkin get back to where it’s most familiar, being the hammer instead of the nail. 

The Indians outscored the Warriors in every quarter, including a 17-8 point second quarter that really separated the two teams. After shaky play in the Region Tournament left some questioning if Lumpkin was truly a threat to repeat as State Champs, Dowse feels his team is getting closer to the standard of play he’s known them to achieve.

“I was anxious to see how we would respond after the Wesleyan game and see how hungry we were to take on the challenge,” he said. “And for the most part I was pretty pleased. We had a couple of defensive breakdowns but we looked like us, getting out in transition….For the most part I felt like we kind of looked like we do when we’re playing pretty well.”

Junior Averie Jones led the way for the Indians, taking over from the jump with 28 points including a nine-point first quarter where she single handedly outscored Oconee 9-7. 

“I thought Averie played great on both ends of the floor,” Dowse said. “She locked down [Kylie Wilson] who was giving us a little trouble in the first half.”

When it wasn’t Jones, Mary Mullinax picked up the slack, scoring 22 points of her own including seven in the fourth quarter to slam the door shut on any potential comebacks the Warriors might’ve been dreaming up. 

While Dowse said he prefers when everyone is scoring, he recognizes the ability of his individual scorers to take over a game and score in bunches.

“I like it balanced, but you can’t have that every game and when you don’t, somebody has to pick up the slack and I thought Averie was really good,” he said. “Coming off some ball screens, the last couple of games she struggled a little with that, but tonight she read it correctly and made shots.”

If there’s one area where Dowse still feels there could be significant improvement, it’s on defense, where he feels championships are won or lost.

"I want us to keep getting better defensively,” he said. “We did some really good things but we had some breakdowns, so I’d like us to get better defensively. At this time of year, defense is going to win. The scouting reports are out and teams have so much film and put so much into the planning of taking away what you want to do offensively, that you have to create some things off of your defense. We did some of that tonight which allowed us to get out and run a little bit.”

With the win, Lumpkin now advances to the Round of 16, where the Indians will travel to face Lakeview-Fort Oglethorpe, which squashed Cedar Grove 69-28. While a win would only be one of several dominoes needed to fall Lumpkin’s way for the Longhouse of Lumpkin County to see the Indians take the floor at home one last time this season in the Elite Eight, Dowse acknowledged that it was likely the last home game for his team this season.

“We do have an outside chance of potentially playing here next week,” he said. “There are a couple of games that would maybe have to be minor upsets and then we’d have to win a coin-toss. It’s unlikely, but it could happen. We’re definitely on the road this Friday and if we don’t get to play here Tuesday, then the rest of it’s neutral site stuff.”

Although a win at Lakeview-Fort Oglethorpe will be no easy task, as the LFO currently sits at No. 5 in all of AAA.

“I appreciate the turnout here tonight and I hope they get in their cars and travel up to Fort Oglethorpe with us,” he said. “It’s going to be a rowdy crowd, I think, Friday Night at LFO and I hope our folks will follow us up there because we’ll need the support.”