By Stan Caldwell/Sports Writer

HATTIESBURG – George County’s regular-season finale didn’t go as planned, but the Rebels have a whole week to put it behind them and get ready for the region tournament.

George County was unable to sustain a red-hot start, as Hattiesburg rallied, gained the lead and held on to hand the Rebels a 51-43 defeat in a key Region 3-6A contest Friday night at Watkins Gymnasium on the HHS campus.

George County heads into the region tournament at Terry with a 14-12 overall record, including 4-6 in region. That locks the Rebels into the fourth spot for the opening round of the tournament, which begins Feb. 9.

The Tigers improved to 12-11 and 5-4, clinching third place in the region with two games left on their schedule.

“Like I told my guys, we’ve got make free throws, layups and wide-open 3’s,” said Rebel coach Terry Bradley. “You’ve got to do that to win these days. That was the difference in tonight’s game.

Indeed, the stat sheet showed the difference pretty clearly. GCHS made its first two attempts from 3-point range, then didn’t make another 3-pointer the rest of the night. HHS was 4 of 10 from beyond the arc.

“When they got a three, they made it,” Bradley said. “We had several good looks at it, and I think we only made a couple, and we probably shot 20. We’ve got to make 3s in this league.

“They’ve got a good defensive team, and they wanted to get the ball out of L.B.’s hands. So they ran people at him and wore him down.”

The biggest difference came at the foul line. After missing their first seven shots, Hattiesburg began to get penetration in the lane and along the baseline, either getting layups or drawing fouls.

The Tigers converted 21 of 34 free throws (67.8 percent), compared to 9 of 17 (52.9 percent) for George County.

For the first three minutes, the Rebels looked like world beaters, building a quick 8-0 lead.

Junior Braylon Fairley swished a trey after getting a steal with the opening possession of the game, then junior L.B. Bradley came down after a defensive stop and nailed a soft 12-foot jumper from the left side, and capped the quick start with a 3-ball from the left baseline.

“It’s just basketball, you have to do what you can to win,” said L.B. Bradley. “Hopefully, we can get to the playoffs and make some noise.”

L.B. did his part for GCHS, scoring a game-high 23 points, but he didn’t get much with sophomore Karsyn Fairley out with an injury.

“We were missing Karsyn tonight,” said Bradley. “He’s been scoring about 20 points a game for us, and it’s hard to make that up when he’s not out there. But Hattiesburg gets after you on defense and they play extremely hard.”

After a slow start, Hattiesburg reeled the Rebels back in with a 9-4 surge to close the first quarter, with GCHS still leading 12-9 after the first eight minutes of play.

The Tigers made short work of that lead in the opening minutes of the second quarter, reeling off six unanswered points, taking the lead for the first time on a 3-point shot by senior Zavian Martin.

“This was a big win for us,” said Hattiesburg coach Joey Wade. “Even though it was Senior Night, with a lot of distractions, we needed to make sure we got this win to make sure we secure third place.

“The game plan was similar to the one we had the last time we played them (a 71-49 Tiger victory on January 13). But L.B. hit some big shots for them, and he kept it close, but our guys did what they needed to do to pull it out.”

George County regained its momentum and regained the lead, and led by as much as four points, 23-19, on Bradley’s drive down the lane midway through the second quarter.

But Hattiesburg started getting to the foul line and making its free throws, six in a row at one point, and Martin put the Tigers ahead for good in the final minute of the first half, 27-26, with a 16-footer from the left wing.

HHS looked like it was ready to pull away early in the third quarter, building a 36-29 lead on back-to-back 3-pointers by junior Joseph Nichols and Martin. Those two did the most damage for Hattiesburg, Martin scoring 19 points and Nichols with 11.

But the Tigers went cold the rest of the period, and George County got back in the game with a layup by senior K.J. Fairley and a drive down the lane by senior Justice Gaines.

HHS build an eight-point lead twice in the second half, before the final margin, but Bradley single-handedly brought the Rebels back to begin the fourth quarter.

He scored on a drive down the lane, a six-footer from the right side, then swished a 16-foot jumper from the right baseline and got a putback layup to pull the Rebels to within two, 43-41.

But the next possession proved to be the dagger for GCHS, as Martin converted a long 3-ball, and the Tigers were 5 of 6 from the line in the final period, pulling away with an8-2 run to close out the game.

Bradley said his kids would spend the week before the regional, working on preparing for an elimination game against Forest Hill in the opening round of the tournament.

“We’ve got a week to get healthy,” said Bradley. “We’ve got a lot of shooting to do, a lot of defensive drills. We’re going to work on a lot of fundamental stuff, keep that intact, and hopefully we’ll get another shot at Hattiesburg.”