Normally a 10-point win, especially against a region opponent, is cause for cheer but Bryan County’s 67-57 win over Claxton last Friday left first-year coach Jason Napier exasperated.

What should have been a dominant win became somewhat of a nail biter in the fourth quarter in the Region 3A-DII game that left the Redskins (10-5, 4-4) coach considering the possibilities if Claxton had been a better shooting team or if his team had been playing region powerhouses McIntosh County Academy or Savannah High.

It was a frustrating week for Napier who had watched his team drop a 54-50 game at Jenkins County on Tuesday after racing out to a double-digit early lead and then on Thursday night it slipped past Bulloch Academy, 55-50, after having beaten the Gators, 73-48, last month.

With the season heading into the home stretch – the Redskins have nine regular season games remaining starting with a home game Tuesday night with McIntosh County Academy—Napier is looking for a strong finish to improve his team’s seeding in the region tournament.

Currently MCA (13-3, 8-0) and Savannah (11-4, 7-1) have a lock on first and second with Portal (7-9, 5-3) in third. Bryan County played Savannah Classical Academy on Wednesday night and will be at Portal on Friday. 

For the most part Bryan County has been a slow starting team this season and it was no different against Claxton as the two were tied, 16-16, after the first quarter. However, behind the play of Mike Smith and Darius Edwards the Redskins took charge in the next eight minutes and led 35-24 at the intermission.

The game was tied at 20-20 when Edwards put back a miss by Jadon Odum, was fouled and made the free throw with 5:52 on the clock to give his team the lead for good. Smith, coming off a 22-point game at BA, then drove the baseline to help trigger a 15-4 closing run.

The lead grew to 21 points, 49-28, with 2:33 left in the third and that’s when things began to get dicey. Claxton scored the final six points of the quarter and the first eight of the fourth to make it a nine-point game with six minutes left.

“The way teams shoot the three-ball now with a nine or 10 point lead they’re just three shots away,” Napier said. “And we were playing like we were thinking the game was over, letting them throw the ball over the top and letting the kid shoot a wide open three."

“At one point we had a 20-point lead and they got it to 15 but we were still good,” Napier said. “Thinking the game was over, we just gave up about 10 trash points. We were happy with a 10-point win when we could have won by 25 or 30.” 

Smith finished with 17 points and Edwards had a season high 16 while Elijah Mincey and Odum had 10 each. Smith had 19 points at Jenkins County and Mincey 13.

Poor free throw shooting cost the Redskins in the four-point loss to the Bulldogs as they made only 14 of 28 attempts. They were 14-25 against Claxton.