Decatur Girls and Boys Lose to North Cobb at Deep South Classic

The North Cobb girls broke open a close game Wednesday by scoring the first eight points of the second half in a 66-50 victory over Decatur High in the first round of the Deep South Classic.

Decatur, ranked seventh in the AA Coaches Poll, actually led by two after one quarter and trailed the sixth-ranked (in AAAAA) Warriors 36-31 at the half.

But as Decatur coach Bill Roberts said, “You can’t afford to have a bad quarter against a good team, and tonight one bad quarter (the third) did us in.”

The Decatur boys, after playing one of their best halves of the season (the midpoint score was 25-25), dropped a 62-54 decision to a large North Cobb squad. North Cobb, now 8-3, pulled ahead to stay early in the third, though Decatur cut it to five inside the last minute.

The good news is that point guard Kurt Robinson appeared nearly 100 percent Wednesday, scoring 20 points and hitting 7 of 11 two pointers. He suffered a sprained ankle five weeks ago. Sophomore Davnate Meadows added 15 while senior Desmond Tuft hit three consecutive three pointers for his nine points.

The boys, now 4-7, will play the loser of Wednesday’s Brookwood-Richmond Academy game Thursday at 3 p.m. (no Deep South scores had been posted on any of several web sites consulted as of this writing; the tournament’s web site is deepsouthclassic.com).

The girls play the Brookwood-Chattahoochee loser at 4:30 p.m.

Queen Alford led the Decatur girls with 19 points while Sara Payne, who may prove a crucial outside weapon in the season’s second half, added 12 on three three-pointers. Jordan Dillard had a season’s low eight, all in the second half.

North Cobb’s precocious sophomore Taylor Gordon, an ESPN Top 100 player, led all scorers with 24.

“We learned a lot from this game,” Roberts said. “It taught us that you have to manage every possession, that every possession is important. You can’t just play one half or three good quarters and be satisfied. This game will pay off because it taught us you have to play all 32 minutes.”