Bryson City – It didn’t matter where Torin Rogers was on the court during Friday night’s Big Smoky Mountain Conference Tournament final.
On defense, she set the tone early by blocking four Robbinsville shots. And on the offensive end, the Lady Knights had no answer, with the 6-foot, 1-inch senior attacking inside and off the dribble. With 30 points and 12 rebounds from Rogers – and an excellent defense – Murphy prevailed over Robbinsville 56-49 to win its fifth straight conference tournament title.
“She is a special talent,” Lady Bulldogs head coach Ray Gutierrez said. “Like I tell people, she could go down as the best player in Murphy High School history. We’ll look back one day and really understand one day how special she was.”
With Rogers putting a virtual padlock on the paint, Murphy (23-3 overall) had another strong defensive effort against the Lady Knights. Robbinsville is better when it gets points out of its press and goes up and down, but the Lady Bulldogs have made them work in the half court in all three wins against them this year.
Murphy was quick to the ball on the perimeter, taking advantage of the fact that outside of Desta Trammell, the Lady Knights do not shoot a lot of threes. Trammell heated up in the fourth quarter to finish with 16, but senior Amber Martin didn’t make it easy while she was on the court despite fouling out late in the fourth quarter.
“Amber’s one of those players you can’t win without,” Rogers said. “Especially her defense tonight, she’s just such a smart player – smartest player on our team – and she knows how to guard big players like Desta.”
Rogers scored six in the first quarter and got some additional help on the offensive end. Martin hit an early triple, and Addie Johnson added two before the first quarter was over to help the Lady Bulldogs build a 15-7 lead.
Robbinsville shot under 20 percent in the first half, and eight of its 17 first half points came from the foul line. Murphy had some struggles with the Lady Knights’ press early, but settled in and led 26-17 at halftime.
After scoring 10 in the first half, Rogers doubled that in the third quarter. The Lady Bulldogs have been a five-out team at times this year but have gotten Rogers more post touches in recent weeks. She scored 10 of Murphy’s 13 third-quarter points, taking advantage of the mismatches in the post.
“We’re trying to play around with different sets,” Gutierrez said, “and put in a couple things that I thought that was very, very good against Robbinsville.”
A Lailee Holloway three early in the fourth quarter extended the lead to 42-25, the Lady Bulldogs’ largest of the night. With Trammell’s shot starting to fall, Robbinsville tried to rally but Murphy always had an answer.
After the Lady Knights scored seven straight to cut the lead to 42-32, Rogers scored the next seven for the Bulldogs. Add in two free throws from Calista Adams, and Murphy led 51-39 with 2:26 left.
Martin fouled out with 1:35 left to give Robbinsville a potential opening because of her role on defense and as a ball-handler. However, the Lady Bulldogs hit enough foul shots to secure the win.
Throughout this season, Murphy has passed almost every test. The Lady Bulldogs picked up two wins against some of north Georgia’s best teams in the non-conference schedule, then lost all but one game to conference competition.
The only goal left is the big one. Some didn’t think Murphy had the team to be in position to compete for a third straight state championship, but Gutierrez had a good feeling after watching his team this summer.
In what looks like a much tougher 1A West bracket than last season, it’s one game at a time from this point on. The No. 1 seed Lady Bulldogs hosted No. 32 seed Elkin in the first round Tuesday night, after this week’s edition of the Cherokee Scout went to press.
“It’s going to be tight,” Gutierrez said. “And I think there’s about six or seven teams that can come out of the (1A) West. Hopefully, we can play solid and good basketball each and every night we play.”