Salem girls basketball team moves on to Sweet 16

CONYERS, Ga. - It wasn’t easy, but the Salem girls basketball team is moving on to the Sweet 16.

Ayanna Mitchell scored 27 points to lead three in double figures as the Seminoles defeated River Ridge 49-40 in the first round of the Class AAAAA state playoffs on Tuesday.

Salem (21-8), which has won eight consecutive games, will host Region 2 runner-up Cross Creek in Friday’s round of 16.

Leonor Nickell, who led the visitors from Woodstock with 15 points, hit a 3-pointer with 3:25 to play in the game that sliced Salem’s lead in half to 40-37. The deciding stretch followed and Salem got some separation thanks to a pair of River Ridge turnovers.

After the first miscue, Shay Tarver got to the free-throw line, and though she missed the front end of a 1-and-1 situation, Mitchell corralled the rebound and her put back made it 42-37. After the second River Ridge turnover, Tarver again went to the line and missed the first charity shot and Mitchell had a nearly-identical put back and it was a seven-point game with 1:27 left.

River Ridge, the No. 4 seed from Region 7 which has appeared in the state playoffs in all five years of its existence, got as close as 44-39 when Nickell converted a lay-up at the 1:09 mark, but Mitchell added another put back to make things a bit more comfortable the Conyers school.

Mitchell’s offensive rebound turned into a three-point play with five and a half minutes left in the third and gave the Seminoles their largest lead of the night at 28-18.

Sydney Rodie hit a three and had a conventional three-point play during a 10-3 run for River Ridge, getting the visitors to within 31-28 with a little more than a minute to play in the quarter. That come back happened in large part to Mitchell picking up her fourth foul with three and a half minutes left. The LSU signee didn’t check back in until the 4:16 mark of the fourth, which followed a nice Tarver drive and scoop shot and a 3-pointer by Paris Scott that put Salem up 38-32.

After neither team could get anything going in the opening quarter, things picked up in the second.

Salem took its first lead of the night at 8-6 when a steal led to Mitchell’s put back at the 7:23 mark. Though the Knights immediately tied the game on a nice Rodie-to-Nickell lay-in on an inbounds pass, then took a 10-8 lead on a bucket by Faith Arthur, the cushion was brief.

Mitchell scored seven of her 13 first-half points over the final six minutes, and Tarver picked up her first points of the night on a 3-point play with 1:52 to go that put Salem ahead 19-14. River Ridge got to within one possession on a long 2-pointer from Katie Popp, but Mitchell hit a free throw and Scott drained a 3-pointer in the corner that sent the Seminoles into the halftime locker room with a 23-16 lead.

Nickell scored all six River Ridge points in the first quarter as the Woodstock school led 6-4 after one. Nickell picked up a costly, third foul when Tarver drove right past the junior forward for the lay-in that turned into the three-point play.

Tarver added 11 points and Scott, 10 for Salem, which will be trying to get back to the Elite 8 for the second consecutive season after never getting to that point before 2013.