Respect Your Elders and Alpha Elite shoot the lights out in Alpharetta playoff matchup

Frankie Ghouchani of Respect Your Elders

There are games that occur where it seems cruel for either team to lose. It’s nice to say, but the reality of sports is that the odds suggest your team’s season is almost certain to end in a loss.

That’s how Alpha Elite’s season ended last night, despite them scoring 109 points on 51% shooting from the field and 55% shooting from deep. Respect Your Elders were two points better in a 111-109 quarterfinal victory that was decided in overtime.

It’s a tough pill to swallow for Alpha Elite, who played so well despite finishing the regular season 1-6, the worst record in the league. In my opinion, it’s still better to get knocked out in a close game where a full effort was given, playing the best you possibly can; sometimes the better team still wins.

A full effort was absolutely needed by both teams, as they each played with only five players. Iron five games can often drain the energy in the gym, and tired legs can turn into plenty of missed shots. For both of these teams to shoot over 50% from the field is remarkable, especially considering that each player had to play an additional three minutes since the game went to overtime.

That did not hinder the shooting at all last night, as these teams combined to shoot 79-136 (58%) from the field and 45-77 (58%) from deep. Every single player scored 10 points or more in the game, and eight out of the 10 players shot 50% or better from the field. Even the player who had the worst shooting performance, Dewy Barfield of Alpha Elite (who shot 3-13 from the field), had 16 rebounds, with 12 coming on the offensive end, and shot 4-4 from the free-throw line. Everyone contributed in this classic.

It is Respect Your Elders who are moving on to play YE DTA in the semifinals, and they got there through an incredible offensive performance. The scoring leader for them in this game was Sari Papazian, who had 31 points on 11-17 shooting from the field and 8-12 shooting from deep. He was joined by Hat McCarthy and TY Gaskins in lighting it up from the outside, as McCarthy shot 7-10 from deep for 21 points, while Gaskins shot 6-9 from deep for 26 points. Lucky Johnson put in the most complete statistical performance, putting up 20 points and 16 rebounds (eight defensive and offensive apiece) on 9-11 shooting from the field.

This 111-point performance puts Respect Your Elders’ scoring average to 102.9 per game, the highest mark in the league. With the ability to shoot like this, I doubt any of the remaining teams in Alpharetta are looking forward to playing them.