Jags bring out the brooms against Huffman

Jamal Johnson went airborne to haul in the inbound pass deep in his own backcourt. Once he collected it, he found himself double-teamed by a pair of Huffman defenders.

It didn’t matter.

Johnson, an immensely talented Spain Park senior, escaped the defensive assault. He then dribbled the length of the court and finished the play with a high-flying, one-handed dunk that electrified the home crowd and gave his Jags the boost they needed to hold off Class 7A No. 3 Huffman in a gritty area matchup Friday night.

Johnson scored 10 of his game-high 19 points in the final quarter of Spain Park’s 52-48  victory.

“As always, he rises to the occasion. That’s why he’s a Division I player,” Jags head coach Donnie Quinn said of Johnson, a Memphis signee. “He knows how to win. He knows what to do and just takes a lot of that stuff into his own hands.”

Johnson poured in his team’s first six points of the final frame, extending Spain Park’s lead to 46-39. The seven-point edge signified its largest advantage of the game.

But Huffman didn’t wilt. The Vikings, led by Travarus Carroll's team-high 17 points, went on a 7-0 run to tie the game at 46-46 with 2:10 remaining.

Quinn then gathered his team for a huddle during a timeout.

“I said, ‘Do you really want to read in the paper tomorrow that we lost by 2?’” Quinn recounted. “They said no.”

Johnson proceeded to draw a foul and hit two free throws. After a defensive stand, he executed his highlight-reel jam.

“I just think we’ve lost so many games early on playing against all these prep teams that we’re just so desperate to win right now,” Quinn said. “I mean we just didn’t want to let it go again.”

And they didn’t.

The Jags tightened up defensively in the final minute. After Huffman missed a much-needed free throw with about 15 ticks remaining, the Jags’ Parker Boswell got fouled when gathering a rebound.

His two free throws iced the game.

With the win, Spain Park (8-11) improved to 2-0 in 7A, Area 6. The Jags  defeated Oak Mountain 61-37 in Tuesday’s area opener. Huffman fell to 14-4 overall and 0-2 in the area. 

“I think the team chemistry’s finally starting to jell more than it had,” Quinn said. “We’re finally starting to understand where we are.”

Spain Park led 29-22 at halftime and 40-36 at the end of the third quarter. 

Behind Johnson, Boswell and Xavier Blanchard were Spain Park’s other top scorers. Each tallied eight points. Six of Blanchard’s eight came on a pair of clutch, third quarter 3-pointers.

Girls

With 12 seconds left in the second quarter, Spain Park’s Claire Holt raced down the court, pulled up near the free throw line and knocked down a jump shot right before the buzzer.

The heads-up play from the Jaguar standout  swung the momentum in her team’s favor at a pivotal point in the game. Huffman had trimmed a 13 point Spain Park advantage down to 5 in the final minutes of the first half. The score went from 32-19 to 32-27 in a blink.

But a Holt 3-pointer, followed by the buzzer-beating jump shot, halted the Vikings’ progress. They never really threatened again.

Holt finished the game with a team-high 25 points, spurring Spain Park (13-7, 2-0 Area 6) to a 70-57 victory over Huffman (6-12, 0-2). 

The Lady Jags built on a 37-27 halftime lead in the final two frames. They led 52-38 after three quarters before closing out the game in relative comfort. Spain Park led by as many as 16 points late in the fourth quarter.

In addition to Holt’s prolific performance, three other Lady Jags reached double figures in scoring. Ahrielle Parks contributed 13, while Barrett Herring and Christen Rushing chipped in 10 apiece.  

Huffman's Jayla Crawford totaled a game-high 31 points. 

OTHER ACTION

In other local games, Oak Mountain faced off against Mountain Brook in the other Class 7A, Area 6 battle. Oak Mountain won the girls game, 49-24, while the Spartans rebounded to dominate the boys game, 63-32. You can read a recap of those games here. 

Briarwood Christian School faced off against Shelby County, and earned a split. The girls team won 42-35 and the guys fell 52-49 in a tight one.

Chelsea faced off with Pelham in a Class 6A, Area 8 matchup. In the girls game, the Lady Hornets coasted to a 58-40 victory. Joseph Lanzi's 14 points were not enough for the boys, as Pelham topped the Hornets, 53-38.