Hillcrest boys and girls basketball teams defeat Hale County: What we learned

Brett Greenberg

The Tuscaloosa News

Both the boys and girls basketball teams from Hillcrest won their games against Hale County on Friday night. Here are three things we learned:

Hillcrest boys back get back on track

Losers of their last two games, the No. 10-ranked Patriots picked up a non-region win, 76-61.

Coach Scott Suttles was very animated on the bench throughout, but his team settled down and ended up playing its best ball in the fourth quarter.

"We want to win every quarter," said Suttles. "We got the win, but we are not very good on the defensive side. Hopefully, we can learn before we face a really good Huntsville team."

The Patriots are now 6-3 and look to take their momentum from this win into next week when they host Huntsville on Monday night.

Drive-and-kick and suffocating defense

The Hillcrest Lady Patriots used their shot-making ability and full-court press to deny the Hale County Lady Wildcats of a road win by a score of 42-31.

From the tip, coach Nick Browder had his team in a full-court press, producing 15 turnovers.

“We want to create a fun brand of basketball here,” said Browder. “We want the girls to enjoy it, the fans too, and that starts on the defensive side of the ball”

Junior forward Brooksie Suttles led the Patriots in scoring with 12 points.

The win brings the Lady Patriots' record to 9-4 as they gear up for a non-region matchup at Vestavia Hills on Monday night.

Hale County plays up, shows fight

The Hale County Wildcats (Class 3A) punched above their weight against the Patriots (Class 6A).

Senior guard Georgianna Hall added to her season total this year with 10 points despite being taken out of the game in the final minutes of the first half due to injury. Hall leads the Wildcats in scoring with 11.6 points per game while leading the team in every other statistic as well.

Junior guard Jamarion Ryans continued to show why he is the Wildcats' No. 1 option on offense. Ryans leads the team in scoring with 20 points per game and has nearly 30 more assists than the next assist leader. Ryans finished with 25 points.