When Southwest junior Chase Dupree went up for a dunk against a defender in the fourth quarter of the Patriots’ state tournament semifinal game, everything changed.
As Dupree soared through the air after receiving a pass in transition, much of the sizable Southwest crowd at Georgia College and State University’s gym rose from their seats in one sweeping motion, hands extended upward.
Then Dupree dropped the hammer, posterizing the Toombs County Bulldogs player who stood in his way to draw a foul on the emphatic two-handed slam and give the Patriots their largest lead of the night so far.
“That was game over,” Dupree said. “I knew it. Right then.”
Though there were still about six minutes left to play, Dupree’s gut instinct was right — the Patriots kept the lead and ran out the clock on Toombs County, riding the energy of the impassioned crowd to secure a 65-54 win in the Final Four of the GHSA Class A-Division I state tournament Saturday night and advance to the championship game in Macon next weekend.
“‘Here’s the momentum,’ that’s the first thing I thought,” Southwest head coach Monquencio Hardnett said of his star player’s jam. “That was the play we’d been waiting on, that was what we needed… that play right there really turned it for us.”
Southwest overcame some offensive struggles early and went down by as many as 11 points in the second quarter. A key part of that was shifty Toombs County guard Mike Polke, who made some tricky floaters look easy and beat Southwest off the dribble to score 11 of his 19 points in the opening half.
The Patriots used the third quarter to get it down to a one-possession game before matching the Bulldogs basket-for-basket, though. A buzzer-beater from downtown by junior C.J. Howard then gave the Patriots a 42-40 lead going into the fourth quarter.
“We didn’t necessarily come out how I wanted to, but we picked it up defensively,” Dupree said. “I’m just so proud of them.”
With the score at 44-43 with about seven minutes left, Southwest took control. Dupree’s massive play at the rim was the coup de grace of an 8-0 run that took the wind out of Toombs County’s sails and made the swaths of Southwest fans scream in approval.
The Bulldogs would score a few more buckets but could not piece together the comeback. After senior Brandon Ashley hit a 3-pointer with 1:30 left that kept it an eight-point game, the celebration more or less began.
“I knew when I dunked it, but then it was really over,” Dupree said of his teammate’s dagger from beyond the arc. “We trust Brandon, so when he shot it I knew it was going in.”
The three star players — Dupree, Howard and Ashley — have been focal points for Southwest all season and each hit crucial shots down the stretch. Howard led the team with 23 points on the night. Dupree followed closely with 21 points, while Ashley scored 17.
The Patriots will play B.E.S.T. Academy, a boys-only public school in Atlanta, for the championship in the Macon Coliseum March 8 at 1 p.m. It will be Southwest’s first state title appearance since it won the trophy in 1989, according to Hardnett.
“It means everything to me and the team,” he said. “We’ve worked for this for years. To do it with these kids that I’ve worked with since ninth grade, it’s fitting that they’re in this position… we haven’t done it since ‘89, and doing it with this group makes me so proud.”
While Hardnett himself played for Central back in the day, he’s still an authority on the Patriots’ illustrious history, which includes a dominant run of six state titles between 1973 and 1989 and a National Championship in 1979.
Two of Hardnett’s uncles played on some of Southwest’s championship teams under head coach Duck Richards in the ‘70s and ‘80s. His family and Southwest have been tied together for generations.
Plenty of those family members were at the semifinal game Saturday night. Hardnett ascended the steps at the side of the court not long after the buzzer sounded, making his way through a long line of grinning friends and embracing each of them.
He could not decide which hug meant the most.
“My mom, my fiance, so many family members. And the players, man, they brought me here,” he said. “They all mean the world to me.”
The Patriots had a marked crowd advantage that gave them a boost as well, despite the game being in Milledgeville instead of Macon.
At least 200 Southwest students, parents and fans crowded the GCSU arena — many of them wearing white T-shirts adorned with “The South Got Something To Say!”, an adage of Outkast rapper Andre 3000 the school adopted as a rallying cry — and easily outnumbered Toombs County’s supporters.
“The whole city out now. When the whole city come out to support us, it brings us a different energy,” Dupree said. “It makes us on fire.”
Dupree, a leader all year for the Patriots, said the victory made him think back to the offseason.
“This year it started off by getting up at six in the morning. And I made my team get up at six in the morning, get involved, get the work,” he said. “That’s how we got here.”
The work will resume this week as Southwest preps for B.E.S.T. Academy.
“It might feel like a month,” Dupree said of the long layover between games. “But we want to dominate. I want to dominate and give my team the ball.”
This story comes to GPB through a reporting partnership with The Macon Melody.
