By BAKER ELLIS / Sports Editor

MONTEVALLO – The Montevallo basketball Bulldogs dominated 4A Area 7 throughout the 2016 season, going a perfect 6-0 in the regular season. The Bulldogs earned a de facto spot in the finals of the area tournament since Holy Spirit was disqualified from postseason play, and beat Oak Grove in the championship round by a final of 73-56 that was not as close as the scoreboard made it seem on Feb. 11. The win was big for a Montevallo team that hit a slight rough patch at the end of the regular season.

“It means a lot, it just gives us confidence going forward in the playoffs,” Montevallo head coach Gregory Dickinson said after the game. “I think we got a lot better on our defense, that’s what we were really trying to work on, and our boxing out and rebounding. I think that helped us, especially with this game we wanted to focus on boxing out. Hopefully it will roll over to the next game.”

Montevallo jumped out to an early 18-5 lead at the end of the first quarter behind eight first quarter points from Te’ Smith. Smith added another six in the second quarter as the Bulldogs built an insurmountable 35-19 lead that Oak Grove never bounced back from.

The Bulldogs kept their half-court zone defense extended all the way to the midcourt line for most of the third quarter, rendering the Oak Grove offense essentially useless. Tavarus Hall had 10 points in the third quarter as the Bulldogs stretched their lead to 57-30 after three quarters, and the fourth was more of the same.

Moving forward, Dickinson said the Bulldogs have to stay sound defensively and continue to rebound effectively if they are going to have any shot of making a deep playoff run.

Smith had 19 points and 11 rebounds on the night while Hall finished with 16 points and 10 rebounds to lead the Bulldogs, who moved to 21-8 with the win.