Columbus girls fall to Southwest Dekalb in state quarterfinals

Columbus girls basketball coach Joe Cherrone felt like the winner of his team’s game against Southwest Dekalb on Friday in the Class 5A quarterfinals would go on to win the state championship.

He was hoping it would be the Lady Blue Devils. Instead, the Lady Panthers utilized a stingy defense and an offensive outburst in the second and third quarters to overcome an early deficit, knocking off Columbus 65-50.

The loss ended Columbus’ season and its hopes of returning to the state championship game for the second time in three seasons. Southwest Dekalb will play in the state semifinals against the winner of Loganville and Sequoyah.

Despite the loss, Cherrone was upbeat after the game. He praised his team’s fight, looked forward to a bright future and commented on the offseason improvements it would have to make to take the next step a year from now.

“The girls have a lot of fight,” he said. “It was their first year together with Ariyah (Copeland) back and we added (sophomore) Trinity Vasquez. We’ve got nowhere to go but up.”

Columbus returns every single one of its players on the roster next season, including Copeland, who in her first year back from two knee injuries, averaged 15 points and 11.1 rebounds. She landed right on her average on Friday, scoring 15 points in the loss to Southwest Dekalb. The team’s leading scorer the past two years, Tatyana Wyatt, will also return. She averaged 22.1 points throughout the season and, like Copeland, hit her average on the nose on Friday.

Those two girls, who stand at 6-foot-3 and 6-foot-2, respectively, are the focal points on the offense going forward, but Cherrone said the No. 1 priority over the offseason would be the team’s ball handling.

The team ran into trouble in that area on Friday when the Lady Panthers offered a continuous full-court press throughout the contest, forcing Columbus into a number of turnovers that resulted in points at the other end.

“They have great guards,” Cherrone said of Southwest Dekalb. “We need to be able to play at that level when we get to this point in this season. Our first priority is to improve our ball handling next year.”

Even without the turnovers, Columbus was going to have its hands full with Daisa Alexander, who will play major college basketball at the next level. On Friday, Alexander scored 30 points, 24 of which came in the second half. She scored 12 points in the third quarter, nine coming on three from long range, to put the Lady Panthers ahead by 12 going into the final quarter.

“She just found her shot and converted on just about everything she put up in the third,” Cherrone said. “She’s a big-time player.”

Despite the loss, Cherrone sees it as a learning experience to take going forward. Going into the region tournament, he said, most people would have picked Carver to win the top seed out of Region 1-5A.

“To be able to win the region and make it to the quarterfinals, it’s big for us,” he said. “(Southwest Dekalb) had great size at guard, great defense, a lot of senior leadership. It’s tough to get to this point period. We just want to take this experience and learn from it for next year.”

This story was originally published February 26, 2016 at 5:26 PM with the headline "Columbus girls fall to Southwest Dekalb in state quarterfinals."