TUNNEL HILL, Ga. – Bria Clemmons is a classic drive-and-dish point guard, but Tuesday night the Northwest Whitfield Lady Bruins needed more.
Facing St. Pius X in the first round of the GHSA Class AAAA playoffs, Clemmons delivered, and then some. The junior scored 16 of her game-high 18 points in the first half as Northwest built a big early lead and hung on to defeat the Lady Golden Lions 61-48.
The Lady Bruins (23-5) will travel Friday night in the second round to Jesup to face Wayne County, a 38-35 winner over West Laurens on Tuesday.
“It was a kind of an offensive coming-out party for Bria tonight,” Northwest coach Greg Brown said. “She’s very capable of doing that. Normally she’s a pass-first point guard, but tonight she had to take on a mentality of scoring more for us. She got some big ones early for us, no doubt about it.”
Clemmons began the game with a short runner and followed with a 3-pointer for a quick 5-0 lead. Feeding off their point guard’s energy, the rest of the Lady Bruins picked up their games as well. Chandler Hiland hit a 3-pointer and Clemmons completed another strong drive as Northwest streaked to a 12-3 lead in the first five minutes.
After a St. Pius timeout, Hiland and Clemmons hit back-to-back treys and Whitley Brooker closed out the dominating first period with another bomb as the lead stood at 22-10.
The Northwest Express didn’t stop there, with Clemmons opening the second period with three consecutive drives and a 28-12 lead.
“I had to come out and commit myself to getting the ball to the goal more instead of passing back out all the time,” Clemmons said. “We played well from the start, and if we do what we can do there’s no reason we can’t make a long playoff run.”
The Lady Bruins were strong on the defensive end as well, led by post Mary Kate Allen, who had five rebounds and a pair of blocked shots early. The Northwest guards consistently harassed St. Pius ball-handlers and three times dove on the floor for loose balls, the last one leading to Nicole Bates’ layup off a pass from Clemmons and a 35-17 halftime lead.
It was the kind of effort Brown wanted to see after an upset loss to Heritage in Friday’s Region 7 championship game.
“Obviously things didn’t go the way we wanted for the fourth year in a row at the region tournament, “Brown said. “That gets old and it’s hard for these kids, especially the seniors who have finished region runner-up four years in a row. I can sit here and say it doesn’t matter and all that, but it does matter to them and they played like it tonight from the opening tip.”
St. Pius (17-11) came to life offensively in the second half, but Northwest answered each run as the lead never got under 13 points in the third period and never got below 10 in the final quarter. Clemmons, Brooker and Hiland worked the clock with precision in the final five minutes as the Lady Bruins wrapped up the win.
Contact Lindsey Young at lyoung@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6296; follow on Twitter @youngsports22.