By Bob Sutton
Special to The Alamance News
Southeast Alamance basketball teams won conference tournament championships for the first time last week.
The girls’ and boys’ teams upended Eastern Alamance in title games Friday night at Roxboro Person.
Tournament games in the Mid-Carolina Conference were held across a three-night period. Here’s how those broke down:
Mid-Carolina Conference girls
Undefeated Southeast nipped Eastern 54-49 in overtime in the final, marking the third tight game between the teams.
Southeast trailed 38-34 going to the fourth quarter. Regulation ended at 46-46.
Shaniya Paylor scored 17 points and Natalie Lopez scored 11 for Southeast (25-0). Clara LaChapelle and Inysia McIver each added nine points.
For Eastern, Rihanna Gregory posted 18 points and Makayla Scott had 13 points.
Southeast had a bye in the quarterfinals and then won 60-14 vs. Williams last Thursday at Eastern Alamance, with Paylor scoring 14 points.
Williams reached the semifinals by topping host Cummings 60-52 in the quarterfinals.
- Eastern (19-5) was home for its first two tournament games — a 73-32 romp past Southern Alamance in the first round and a 53-47 semifinal squeaker against Western Alamance.
Aliya Trollinger had 15 points, Gregory notched 14 points, Scott supplied 13 points, and Bayleigh Burris added 10 points in the Southern game. Sarah Kathryn Maness had 13 points and Brianna White scored 10 points for Southern (3-20).
Trollinger’s 24 points and Gregory’s 17 points led the Eagles vs. Western, which received 23 points from Emery Webster and 11 from Avery Brown. The Warriors played without starter Ava Mitchell.
- Western had an adventurous week in reaching the semifinals.
The Warriors defeated visiting Roxboro Person 76-43 in the quarterfinals two nights after the teams brawled on the same court in a regular-season make-up game, which also was won by the Warriors.
For the tournament game, both teams had three players suspended for punishment from the fight, which included punches thrown in the second half. Reagan Averett’s 25 points, Emery Webster’s 20 points, Avery Brown’s 12 points, and Kayra Benitez’s 11 points led Western.
Mid-Carolina Conference boys
Regular-season champion Southeast topped second-seeded Eastern 59-56 in the championship game, avenging a loss from a week earlier.
The Stallions overcame 8-for-25 shooting on free throws. Davian Edwards poured in 24 points and James Kenan had 15 points for Southeast (22-4), while Mason Murphy’s 21 points and 12 rebounds and Kamaal Smith’s 11 points led Eastern (19-6).
The Stallions edged Roxboro Person, which was host for the semifinal round, by 58-53 last Thursday night after ripping visiting Cummings 74-32 in the quarterfinals a day earlier.
In the semifinal, Edwards scored 20 points, Donnie Fairley had 14 points, Kenan scored 11 points and Landon Gardner provided 10 points. In the Cummings game, Kenan racked up 25 points and Edwards had 22.
- Behind 20 points from Hunter Eichmann and 19 points from Murphy, Eastern defeated Williams 76-61 in last Thursday’s conference tournament semifinal in Roxboro. Bubba Sims had 21 points and Colby Elliott provided 19 points for Williams.
Eastern’s 82-68 home quarterfinal triumph against Graham came despite 23 points from Micah Woods for the Red Devils.
- Williams topped visiting Southern 70-55 in the quarterfinals with 23 points from Elliott and 21 points from Sims. Sincere Thompson’s 15 points and Jasiah Allen’s 14 points led Southern.
- Western lost 67-54 at Roxboro Person in the quarterfinals. Jayden Jones had 21 points, Camden Oliviera notched 14 points and Matt Huffman scored 12 points for Western.
Central Tar Heel 1-A Conference
In the girls’ tournament, Clover Garden defeated third-seeded Woods Charter 55-43 before claiming the championship game against Chatham Charter 41-27 on Friday at River Mill.
Hanna Tickle scored 17 points and Brandi Markham had 10 points for the Grizzlies (17-6) in the title game. Clover Garden and Chatham Charter split two regular-season games and ended at 11-1 atop the conference standings.
On the boys’ side, fourth-place Clover Garden lost to regular-season champion Southern Wake by 80-34 in the semifinals. In the final, third-place Woods Charter nipped Southern Wake 41-38.l year.
