Published: December 30, 2009 11:15 pm      

Into the grinder

Area teams return to region play

Now let’s get serious about basketball.

With the new year comes the real region grind for area teams following the holiday break for round-robin events and a few tournaments.

What teams did in November and December simply prepared them for the second-half run toward postseason action. From here on out, just about every game will count for positioning in the region tournament and, ultimately, for a coveted spot in the state tournament.

Last season, Murray County’s boys and North-west Whitfield’s girls were the only area teams to advance to the state playoffs.

Dalton, Murray and North-west compete in Region 7-4A and Southeast Whitfield competes in Sub-region 6A-3A.

The Lady Bruins are the defending region champions and finished a perfect 17-0 in region play last season. They’re 3-0 in region play so far this season and have outscored their opponents 209-96 in those games.

After defeating Osborne in last year’s region championship game, Northwest advanced to the state quarterfinals, where it lost to eventual state champions Southwest DeKalb.

Currently, they’re the state’s No. 8-ranked team. according to the GaSports.com coaches poll. They’re also the only girls team from Region 7-4A — with 15 teams the state’s largest region — appearing in the state rankings.

Because of their recent dominance, the Lady Bruins always expect a region opponent’s best effort every time they take the floor.

Northwest coach Margaret Stockburger is OK with that, however.

“That’s what we’re striving for, playing our ‘A’ game,” she said. “Everyone will be gunning for us, but that’s to be expected. If we do that, things will be the way we like them to be.”

Each Region 7-4A team plays every other region opponent once. Northwest, Murray County and Dalton also picked up each other as their crossover games, but only one of the two counts in the region standings.

The Lady Bruins and Bruins resume region play Jan. 5 at Hillgrove.

The Bruins are 1-2 in the region with losses to Sequoyah and South Paulding and a win over Sprayberry. The once-beaten Hawks are the state’s No. 1-ranked Class 4A team, so the Bruins have a tough challenge getting back into region competition. Last season Northwest beat Hillgrove, 49-47, in Tunnel Hill.

The Cats and Lady Cats are each 3-1 in early region play, with the Cats beating Paulding, Osborne and Murray County — their first win in Chatsworth in coach Mike Duffie’s four years at Dalton — and a narrow, 70-67, loss to South Paulding. The Cats will resume region play Jan. 9 at Allatoona.

The Lady Cats have region wins over Paulding, South Paulding and Murray County and lost in the final seconds to Osborne, 52-51. Dalton girls coach Jeff McKinney believes the Lady Cats are one of a handful of teams in the mix to make some noise this season.

“There are so many good teams in this region,” he said. “Northwest, Rome, Hillgrove, Osborne, Sequoyah and Woodland. Any of those teams, on any night, could win by 20 points. Every win is crucial.

“I think defensively, we’re as good as anyone in the region. For us, execution on offense is the biggest question mark, but we’re capable of competing with anyone.”

In Chatsworth, the Indians finished third in the region tournament last season and advanced to the state playoffs, where they lost in the first round to Rockdale County. However, matching last year’s success will be a challenge as the Indians had to replace 10 seniors from last year’s squad.

Indians coach Greg Linder believes a return to the state playoffs is still possible.

“We talk about it every day,” Linder said. “Every year, we prepare to beat the best teams in the region and meet our goal of making the region and state playoffs. I think we’ve made great strides so far in the first part of the season and we’re growing up and gaining experience.”

The Indians are currently 1-2 in the region a win over Woodland and losses to Dalton and Sequoyah

Lady Indians coach Traci Rankin recently returned to the sideline after a maternity leave and is hoping Murray County can finish among the top four teams in the region, which would a state playoff berth.

The Lady Indians are 0-3 in region play with losses to Sequoyah, Dalton and Woodland, and they’re riding a five-game losing streak. Their average margin of defeat is more than 20 points in the three region losses, but Rankin is optimistic they can turn things around.

“I’m excited about going (back) into region play,” Rankin said. “We’re hoping to be competitive, but I know we’re not a top two team like Rome or Northwest. But we’ve got depth and I think it’s just a matter of working out the kinks. We should be in the mix of things.”

Both Murray County teams resume region play when they host Rome on Jan. 8, after a road game to Northwest Whitfield on Jan. 5.

Both Southeast teams are making transitions under new coaches — the Raiders with Josh Carter and the Lady Raiders with Elizabeth Crane — and have yet to play a Sub-region 6A-3A game.

Southeast will open region play on Jan. 5 with boys and girls games at Ridgeland.

Carter said the plan for the Raiders is to worry about improving as a team, not where they finish in the standings.

“Our goals are to give more effort, play hard and try to get better at certain things in each game,” he said. “We have to work on our consistency. We’ve been in most game heading into halftime, but in the second half we don’t come out and compete for whatever reason. We’ve just got to focus on us and being consistent. We’re not going to focus on everyone else.”