FLOWERY BRANCH — It lived up to the hype and more.
Class 4A No. 3-ranked Flowery Branch rallied in the final period to knock off second-ranked Henry County 54-50 in the quarterfinals of the Class 4A state playoffs Tuesday night in front of a packed house.
The Lady Falcons (27-3) will play the Carver-Columbus/Heritage-Catoosa winner Saturday at Fort Valley State at 6 p.m. It’ll be the Lady Falcons third-straight trip to the semifinals.
Caroline Wysocki poured in 20 points to pace the Lady Falcons. Ashley Woodroffe tossed in 14 in the win.
“We knew from the beginning that they were a tough team,” Wysocki said. “And we knew their lane attack was their strong suit. We had to keep the pressure in the middle and box them out. I thought Locke did great inside. We did well all around.”
Wysocki and Woodroffe’s play paced the Lady Falcons, but the inside presence of sophomore forward Ashlee Locke was a big factor down the stretch. Locke finished the night with 10 points and 7 boards.
Locke shut down Henry's Paris Mullins inside game, holding her to just 6 points.
“I thought Locke played great,” Branch coach Courtney Newton-Gonzalez said. “Locke gets down on herself a little bit when she misses a shot, but that’s basketball. We kept telling her next play, next play. I thought she played defense fantastic and got some big rebounds. For her to be a sophomore and to continue to fight and play and come down the stretch at the end and played the way she played, I was really proud of her.”
The first half saw 12 lead changes and 7 ties, with Briana Juniel hitting the go-ahead bucket with 20 seconds left, sending Henry County into the locker room with a 30-28 the lead.
Juniel scored 20 points in the first half and finished the night with 28 points.
Woodroffe opened the second half with an old-fashioned 3-point play to give the Lady Falcons a 31-30 lead. But, Henry County, led by Juniel mounted an 8-0 run pushing the lead to 38-31 – the largest advantage of the contest.
The Lady Falcons, however, fought back. Wysocki, Locke and Woodroffe pressed Flowery Branch on a 9-2 spurt, including a key block from Locke that led to Woodroffe’s tying layup, 40-40, with 38 seconds left in the third period.
Heading into the final eight minutes, Henry (28-3) upped the lead to 44-40 at the beginning of the quarter off two Janiya Jones free throws. After that, Flowery Branch went to work.
The Lady Falcons started chipping away. Locke scored in the paint with 7:19 left and Ashley Scott floated a 3-pointer through the net to push the Lady Falcons back to the lead, 45-44 with 6:48 left. Over the next two minutes, Flowery Branch’s defensive effort turned into points from Wysocki and Woodroffe, giving the Lady Falcons a 49-46 lead with 2:35 left.
“You’ve gotta go to the big stops that we had late," Newton-Gonzalez said. "We were hitting our free throws, but our defense got a big stop so we could come down to get the lead to three or four points."
After Henry County’s Juniel cut the lead to one, 49-48, with 2:10 remaining, Flowery Branch began to slow the pace, hoping to run time off the clock and force Henry County to foul.
The game plan worked.
Woodruffe was sent to the line after the Lady Falcons ran more than 40 seconds off the clock. The two free shots gave the Lady Falcons a 51-48 lead with 34 seconds remaining.
Juniel would hit two free throws to close the gap to 51-50 with 25 seconds left but it was the closest Henry would get.
“We have a drill in practice that’s called score, shot, score, so it’s kind of that mentality," Newton-Gonzalez said about running time off the clock. "In the time out, that’s what we kind of went too with our mentality. You've got to get a score, a stop and get the ball back. We haven’t been in that situation probably in years where we had to do that. Just for them to be smart... Caroline had a wide open lane and she was smart to pull it back out. I trusted our free throws at the end and it went in our favor."
