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Using just about every player available to him at some point or another, Savannah Country Day head coach Demetrius Smith guided his basketball team through four turbulent quarters on Friday, Feb. 26 at home. Showing resilience and experience, by night’s end, the Hornets had done something no other Country Day team ever had -- they advanced to an Elite 8 in the A-Private bracket of the Georgia High School Association State Playoffs.

Savannah Country Day punched its historic ticket into the quarterfinals thanks to its gutsy 74-69 victory over Stratford Academy in the Class A Private Sweet 16 contest on Friday at Demere Gymnasium. SCDS now turns its attention toward the winner of Saturday’s Sweet 16 game between Holy Innocents’ and The Darlington School (2 pm tip time). 

If Holy Innocents’ wins, SCDS travels to take on the Bears in Atlanta. A Darlington victory would allow SCDS to host the Elite 8 contest. 

It was a game of runs throughout the first half, and Country Day (17-10) trailed for much of the second half until taking the lead for good at it was Stratford which jumped out to an early 23-11 after one quarter. The Hornets answered with their counterpunch, opening the second stanza by going on a 10-0 run in the period’s first 1:58 of play. 

Despite cutting its deficit to two points in the latter stages before halftime, SCDS couldn’t pull even and the Region 3-A Private champion Hornets trailed 2-seed from Region 1 by a deuce at the break, 41-39.

The game was called relatively tight by the three-person officiating crew in the first half, and that could be putting it lightly. A total of 25 fouls were whistled in the first 16 minutes. SCDS committed seven first quarter fouls (SA - 2) and each squad was called for eight in the second. 

Stratford (19-7) led 55-54 through three quarters and the third stanza alone yielded five lead-changes, but it was SCDS which seemed to have the freshest legs come crunch time, thanks to playing a rotation of 10-12 guys for much of the early portions of the game. 

Senior SCDS guard Erik Brown bucketed back-to-back And-1 layups midway through the fourth quarter to give his team a 63-59 lead with 4:58 to play and the Hornets never trailed again.

Brown led all scorers with 25 points, including 16 after halftime. He was 9-of-13 from the charity stripe, highlighted by clutch makes in the final minute of play. Freshman Rob Spaulding scored eight of his 13 points in the second quarter and 10 different Hornets scored on the night.

Isaiah Josey paced the Eagles in the loss, scoring 16 points while Jack Miscall added 14 (12 in first half) and Ben Baxley 10.

SA -- 23 - 18 - 14 - 14 -- 69

SCD -- 11 - 28 - 15 - 20 -- 74

HALFTIME -- SA, 41-39.

RECORDS -- SA 19-7; SCD 17-10.

Follow Travis Jaudon on Twitter @JaudonSports and contact him at travisLjaudon@gmail.com

Optim Orthopedics supports  Savannah Country Day Athletics.  The team doctor for  Savannah Country Day is Dr. Thomas Alexander . Remember Optim Orthopedics gets you back ino the game!

Photo - Travis Jaudon