Gators end district drought by topping Spartans 67-62

Published 2:34 am Saturday, February 8, 2025

By Jeff Nations

Garrett Hatcher won’t ever forget Friday night.

The Greenwood senior played the role of hero against District 14 rival South Warren, delivering a team-high 17 points and coming up with a steal that he converted the other way into a layup that clinched the Gators’ 67-62 win — the first district win for the program in almost three years.

As the final horn sounded, Hatcher was mobbed by teammates and Greenwood’s student section on the court — not that he minded, not at all.

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“It felt great to knock it in,” Hatcher said of converting the layup. “First district win in about three years and storm the court afterward. That will probably be one of my favorite memories in my life.”

Greenwood (15-10 overall, 1-5 District 14) muddied the postseason a bit with the win. Now it will come down to RPI to decide the third and fourth seed in the District 14 tournament — Warren Central locked up the top spot with win at home against Bowling Green on Friday, with the Purples locked into the second spot in the tournament.

“We know we’ve got either the Purples or the Dragons,” Gators coach Will McCoy said. “We took care of what we could tonight the rest will fall how it falls.”

Greenwood got an inspired performance from Hatcher, who did his damage at the start and the end. Hatcher’s seven first-quarter points, combined with seven from fellow senior Asher Pettus, staked the Gators to a 20-17 lead after one quarter.

Hatcher erupted again in the fourth with a team-best 10 points over the final eight minutes, including that clinching layup in the final seconds.

“He came out aggressive, he played downhill, he kind of put some pressure on those guys,” McCoy said of Hatcher. “I don’t think they were expecting him to come out like that. Man, we know he’s got it in him and he’s showed it at times. We’re hoping that was wake-up party that he needed and those guys needed to kind of get this thing swung back in the other direction.”

The second quarter belonged to another Greenwood senior. Guard Tyler Reiter, who entered the night averaging 2.6 points per game, lit up the Spartans with a barrage of 3-pointers. He hit his first with 6:01 left in the first half, then drilled another, and another, and then one more with 3:25 left in the quarter to push the Gators’ lead to 39-27.

“He’s a rare breed,” McCoy said of Reiter. “He’s a guy that got no varsity minutes until this season. He’s a senior, he’s hung in there, he’s not quit, he’s not moved to another school. He comes to work every day. When I need to display a drill, he’s my guy because he does everything we ask. It’s just awesome to see his work pay off and see these guys rally around him.”

South Warren (14-8, 1-5 District 14) scored the final five points of the first half, with senior Griffin Rardin (game-high 24 points) hitting his third 3 of the night to set the halftime score at 39-32.

The Spartans trimmed the deficit to five by the end of the third at 52-47, then Rardin hit back-to-back long 3-pointers to cap an 8-0 run that put South up 55-54 with 5:03 to play.

Hatcher answered with a bucket inside, then hit a 3-pointer and then a free throw for a personal 6-0 run while South went cold for a critical stretch of more than 2 1/2 minutes.

Bryce Button’s layup off a turnover ended the drought for South and pulled his team back within three with 49 seconds left, but the Spartans had to foul and Nick Simpson hit both free throws.

The Spartans’ Brandon Perkins took the ball the length of the court for a layup to make it a two-point game, and South again had to foul and put Reiter on the line. He made the second free throw to stretch the lead to three with 17 seconds to go.

South Warren, which won the first meeting against Greenwood 78-67 on Jan. 17, still had a chance for the series sweep. Hatcher ended it by swiping a pass at mid court and dashing the other way to connect for the final layup and end the Gators’ four-game losing streak.

Joining Hatcher in double-digit scoring was Reiter with 13 points and Pettus with 10 points along with a team-high eight rebounds.

“We’ve talked to our guys the last couple weeks during this skid that we’ve been on that we’ve got to get back to playing full team basketball,” McCoy said.

Jaxen Decker joined Rardin in double-digit scoring with 10 points and added a team-high eight rebounds.

Greenwood was 16-of-19 at the free-throw line, while the Spartans were just 6-of-9.

“They stepped up and made their free throws,” South Warren coach Carlos Quarles said of Greenwood. “We didn’t have a free-throw attempt in the second half and I just think we need to do a better job of getting to the rim and playing strong.”

SWHS 17 15 15 15 — 62

GHS 20 19 13 15 — 67

SWHS — Rardin 24, Decker 10, Hall 8, Button 6, Shively 4, Willis 4, Jarvis 3, Perkins 2, Page 1.

GHS — Hatcher 17, Reiter 13, Pettus 10, Tuttle 9, Meador 8, Simpson 8, Troutman 2.

GIRLS

South Warren 57, Greenwood 50

Something definitely clicked for visiting South Warren in the third quarter against Greenwood on Friday.

After tallying just 16 points in the first half, the Spartans poured in 27 points in the third quarter to push past the Lady Gators for a 57-50 win.

To put that third-quarter output in perspective, South Warren (10-13, 3-3 District 14) needed an entire game to post that same number against Greenwood (11-12, 3-3 District 14) in a 29-27 loss on Jan. 17.

“It’s nice to see the girls get going a little bit and get a little confidence,” Spartans coach Lane Embry said. “Early on I felt like we were getting really good shots and we just weren’t making them. I felt like we were a little rushed for some reason, it could have been because of Greenwood’s defense, but just talking to them at halftime we said, ‘You’ve got to shoot. If you’re going to shoot, then shoot. Don’t question yourselves. Shoot the basketball.’ And I felt like they were more confident in themselves in the second half.”

Freshman Jooniper Strow got the Spartans going by hitting three straight 3-pointers in a span of less than a minute to turn a 20-16 halftime deficit into a 25-20 lead with 6:05 left in the third.

When Strow cooled down, South Warren junior McLaine Hudson was ready to take over the scoring load. Hudson knocked in a trio of 3s of her own and scored 15 points in the third to stake the Spartans for a 43-35 lead.

“The first time we played them it was a pretty rocky offensively, so I was glad that we came out a little more confident in the third quarter,” said Hudson, who finished with a game-high 25 points and added nine rebounds.

South Warren stretched its lead to as many as 15 points in the fourth before a late surge by the Lady Gators set the final margin at seven.

Strow tallied a double-double with 17 points and 12 rebounds, and Autumn Gatewood gave South Warren a lift in the interior with eight points and six boards.

“We’re struggling, basketball IQ-wise,” Greenwood coach Terrance Williams said. “We’re struggling with in the heat of the moment who the priority is to guard, especially when they hit one 3 you’ve got to guard. And then not only did we give up one 3, we turned around and gave up two and then we turned around and gave up three. Then we forget that McLaine Hudson is still McLaine Hudson.”

Molly Spidel and Anzlee Hendrix had 12 points apiece and Gracyn Nealon just missed a double-double with 11 points and nine rebounds for the Lady Gators, who also got nine points — all on 3-pointers — from Molly Tandy.

SWHS 8 8 27 14 — 57

GHS 8 12 15 15 — 50

SWHS — Hudson 25, Strow 17, Gatewood 8, Lindsey 4, Overbay 3.

GHS — Hendrix 12, Spidel 12, Nealon 11, Tandy 9, Morrison 4, White 2.

Sports Editor, Bowling Green Daily News

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