By BAKER ELLIS / Sports Editor

COLUMBIANA – It was senior night at Shelby County High School on Feb. 3, and the Wildcats welcomed in-county opponent Montevallo to Columbiana as they tried to send their five seniors off on a high note. Cole Pate, Deon Carter, Quinterious Montgomery, Tanner Brooks and David Watkins were all playing their last game in Charles Dickinson Gymnasium, and certainly made it count as Shelby County beat Montevallo in one of the highest-scoring games of the year, 97-91.

“Believe me, we’re a low-50s, high-40s team,” Shelby County head coach Tory Brown said after the game with a slight smile on his face, talking about his teams’ scoring average compared with the shocking offensive output on this night. “We shot the ball well tonight finally. They’re a little smaller than us inside; David had some size on them down low which helped as well. Getting a win is important first and foremost, but being able to do it in this special way on senior night was special.”

For Montevallo, the game was highlighted as much by who wasn’t playing as by who was. Junior swingman Tae’ Smith did not dress for the game due to an undisclosed disciplinary issue; according to Montevallo head coach Gregory Dickinson. This was the first game Smith had missed because of the issue, and Dickinson said it will be the only game Smith misses. With Smith out of the lineup, the Bulldogs lost athleticism and scoring, but also lost size, which is a rare and valuable commodity on this Montevallo team. The lack of height was evident throughout the night and in part led to the Bulldogs’ downfall.

Shelby County led from wire-to-wire, scoring first and never trailing even for a moment. Watkins scored the first bucket of the game, then promptly hit a three off a steal which was followed by another three from Montgomery, and the Wildcats were up 8-0 before the crowd had even settled into their seats. Shelby County hit seven threes in the first period, five coming from Montgomery and Watkins, and the only thing that kept Montevallo in the game early was the play of Tavarus Hall, who had eight points in the first quarter, including a three at the buzzer, to keep Montevallo in the game, down 27-22.

Coupled with Shelby County’s incendiary shooting touch on the night was its hyper-aggressive full-court defense. Montevallo struggled all night to consistently break Shelby County’s press, and routinely went through two or three minute spells without being able to move the ball past half court. The at-times frantic pace of the game also lent itself to a great number of fouls being called, which also hurt Montevallo as the constant whistles made it tough to find any sort of rhythm.

“Any time you speed up tempo of the game you’re going to get a lot of fouls and whistles,” Brown said. “We wore them down with our depth a little bit.”

The Wildcats went up 10 with under a minute to play in the second quarter, but a halfcourt buzzer-beater from Montevallo’s Ahmad Edwards made the score 49-42 at halftime to keep the Bulldogs within striking distance.

That was the story on this night. Shelby County pushed the lead to anywhere between eight and 12 points on a number of occasions before Montevallo responded and pulled within striking distance again. After falling behind by 11 points on two separate occasions in the third quarter, the Bulldogs mounted a 10-3 run to pull within four late in the third. However, the unsung hero for the night, Pate, hit one of his five threes to put the Wildcats back up 65-58. Pate had 15 points in the game, all coming from behind the three-point line. The Wildcats held strong to a 75-66 lead headed into the fourth quarter.

Missed foul shots hurt Montevallo in the final period, as the Bulldogs missed the front end of a number of one-and-one opportunities while the Wildcats took advantage of their chances from the charity stripe. When Watkins drew his fourth foul, Montevallo tried to work the ball inside, but when Undreaz Lilly fouled out not long after, the Bulldogs simply didn’t have the size to make that happen, and also could no longer stop Shelby County from feeding Watkins in the low post.

Down 90-80 with less than two minutes left, the game looked to be winding down before Hall promptly hit three three-pointers in a row, each one deeper than the last, to close the gap to 92-89. The last three Hall hit was a step-back, fade-away heat-check triple that banked in from about 32 feet. However, Montgomery got behind the Montevallo press for an easy bucket not long after, and an exhausted Hall turned the ball over on the ensuing play to ensure the win for Shelby County.

While the loss stung, Dickinson took some silver linings away from the experience.

“There were so many fouls, and we’re not deep on the bench with Tae’ being out,” he said. “That really hurt us. But I feel great about (the game), it let us know we’re not going to quit no matter what kind of adversity hits us. We had some key guys step up tonight. Tavarus Hall really stepped up and took that leadership role and put us on his back.”

There were 50 fouls called in the game, and roughly half of those fouls were called in the fourth quarter. Watkins had 31 points in his last home game for Shelby County while Hall had 37 for Montevallo.