Lady Rebels magical playoffs run comes to an end in the Elite 8

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The Lady Rebels of Mid-Carolina attempted to earn their third consecutive road playoffs win this postseason on Tuesday evening in the Elite Eight. Unfortunately, they came up short in a hard fought battle. Mid-Carolina(11-16, 4-6 region 3-AA) fell 54-43 to Eau Claire(18-8, 7-3 region 3-AA) on the road in the quarterfinals of the 2A state playoffs.

Mid-Carolina and Eau Claire got together for the third time this season on Tuesday, Feb. 26th in front of packed gymnasium on the campus of Eau Claire High School. The lady Shamrocks won the previous two matchups in the regular season, but this matchup had much higher stakes.

The atmosphere in the gym at the start of the game felt like the main event of a highly anticipated heavy weight boxing match. The first quarter was back-and-forth as both teams played every possession of this game like it was their last. Senior point guard Brayden Brooks asserted herself early in this game with six free-throw attempts in the opening period. Mid-Carolina trailed Eau Claire 11-12 at the end of the first quarter.

The back-and-forth between the two teams continued in the second quarter, but the Rebels gave up a crucial run to the Shamrocks with about three minutes left in the first half. They began to foul a little too much, gave up three turnovers and gave up some key offensive rebounds. It resulted in a 11-1 run from Eau Claire to extend their lead.

Mid-Carolina trailed 20-31 at halftime.

The Lady Rebels came out of the halftime break much more focused than they were going into the half. That resulted in a 5-0 run to cut the deficit that started with huge three-pointer from Addie Bowers. Her impact was short lived because she ran into some foul trouble in the third quarter.

Eau Claire took advantage of the Rebels not having one of their best defenders and rebounders on the floor. They answered Mid-Carolina’s run with one of their own and still held a strong lead going into the final period.

The Rebels started the fourth quarter trailing 32-41 and knew they had to leave it all on the floor to complete the seemingly impossible comeback. Mid-Carolina got off to a strong start in the final period with a 9-5 run to pull within five points, 46-41.

Then, disaster hit for the Rebels with a little over three minutes left to play in the game. Bowers fouled out on a questionable reach-in call and head coach Gary Wilbanks was forced to turn to his bench. Also, starting junior guard and leading scorer Brea Boyd went down with a knee injury on a drive to the basket. She did return with about minute left in the game but was hobbled. Mid-Carolina was outscored 7-3 when Bowers and Boyd left the game.

Boyd finished the game with 12 points while Bowers flirted with a double-double, nine points and seven rebounds. Both put together gutty performances, but wasn’t enough to overcome the Shamrocks. The deciding factor for this game came at the end of the second quarter when Eau Claire went on a 11-1 run to close out the first half.

“Well we executed the game plan for about the first quarter and half. We kind of got away from what we needed to do there at the end of the second quarter. We missed a couple of lay-ups, missed a couple of free throws and missed some defensive assignments and that run was the difference,” said Wilbanks.

Congratulations to Mid-Carolina on an outstanding season and making a deep playoffs run. They were 2-9 on Dec. 30th and went 9-5 down the stretch of the season while making it to the quarterfinals of the state playoffs, including two road wins.

“I told these seniors how special they were to me. I saw this bunch while they were in rec ball at the Y[YMCA] and then I start to ask ‘what school do they go to and what school does this one go to’. I knew those girls were coming to me so I expected this to happen when they got here,” said Wilbanks.

He continued, “They are great basketball players, but great people as well. We were 2-9 on December 30th, 2-9 right. If you don’t have great character in that locker room then that season folds and we are not even talking about this. They picked up the pieces, they got it together, they kept coming to work and we made a run. It all goes back to senior leadership I had and I am going to miss this group tremendously.”