Tournament Set To Begin Wednesday

The Piedmont Academy boys basketball team is set for the state tournament and is hoping to continue its successful season.

‘Winning region was awesome for the players,” coach Jimmy Link said. “Now we will look to see what we can do in the state tournament.”

The Cougars (17-7 overall) were scheduled to host Windsor Academy on Wednesday of this week in the opening round of the GISA Class AA state tournament.

Piedmont swept Windsor in the regular season matchups and then defeated the Knights in the region championship game 76-60 last Friday.

“This will be the fourth time we have played them,” Link said “That is always a tough thing to do.”

Ryan Holder led the team with 32 points while Luke Welch scored 31 points in the region championship game.

In the semifinals of the region tournament the Cougars cruised past LaGrange Academy 97-32 behind another 32-point night from Holder. Welch added 22 points as 11 players registered points.

Gavin McCart, Bobby Buggs and Cole Wade each scored 6 points while Spencer Carter, Kavion George and Brody Anderson added 5. Trenton Jones and Layne Cook both had 4 points while Owen Piedra scored two.

The Piedmont boys entered the region tournament as the number six seeded team for AA. However, despite winning the tournament the Cougars dropped to seventh.

Brentwood, a team Piedmont split with during the regular season, moved ahead of the Cougars.

“We only have had two losses since December,” Link said. “One was to John Milledge who is the top team in AAA and the other was to Ola High School, a GHSA team. The GISA uses MaxPreps as a way to compile the rankings but it’s hard to fully understand how it is done. I know the GHSA used to use it but they have gone away from it.”