Socastee boys knock off top seed Bluffton

BLUFFTON — Socastee coach Tommy Johnson believed his team had a chance to win despite being a fourth seed.

Turns out, his players did too.

Travis Frye had 18 points, Donovan Cann added 14 and See Man contributed 11 as Socastee overcame top-seeded Bluffton’s fullcourt press en route to a 70-61 first-round win in the Class AAA playoffs Tuesday night.

“Basketball’s funny. It gets back to if the shots are falling for us we’ve got a chance. If they’re not, we probably don’t,” Johnson said. “… We got a lot of open looks and converted. … When we needed stops and rebounds, we got stops and rebounds.

“… [Our players] went in thinking they could win based on scouting reports we got earlier in the week. We legitimately thought we could go in and win, and that belief is something.”

The Braves also made it count at the free-throw line, where they went 15-for-19. Bluffton went 9 of 25 and made just six of 16 attempts in the fourth quarter.

“We played really well and when it was all said and done, we made our free throws and they didn’t make theirs,” Johnson said.

The loss spoiled a season of firsts for Bluffton. The Bobcats reeled off 19 wins, won a holiday tournament and won the Region VII title.

However, for the second season in a row Bluffton lost at home in the first round.

“Free throws are a big deal in this game and that’s what killed us,” said Bobcats senior Dimitri Lowry, who scored a game-high 26 points. “I don’t think it was a mental thing. It just wasn’t our night from the free-throw line.”

The Braves took a four-point lead into the fourth quarter on a clutch, buzzer-beating 3-pointer by Frye to end the third.

“That shot at the (end of) the third quarter, it was a pretty big dagger,” Lowry said. “Because they had the momentum on their side and we had to come back.”

Johnson and Co. had worked on taming the Bobcats’ press this week and it paid off, helping the Braves get their “first tournament win in seven or eight years,” the coach said.

“They did come out pressing like we worked on the last two days,” he said. “We turned it over a couple of times early but for the most part it was not a factor.”

The Braves play at Hartsville on Friday. After knocking off a No. 1 seed, Johnson isn’t putting a cap on how far the Braves could go.

“I told the guys that eight teams are playing in Lower State on Friday and we’re one of them,” he said. “Crazier things have happened.”

•  SOCASTEE (70) – See Man 11, Donovan Cann 14, Chris Marflake 2, Tyler Matthews 5, Will Caswell 12, Travis Frye 18, Patrick Gardiner 6

•  BLUFFTON (61) – B. Hill 7, J. Scott 5, C. Grant 6, C. Frazier 9, D. Lowry 28, D. Dell 6

• 3-point goals: Socastee 6 (Caswell 2, Frye, Gardiner 2, Matthews); Bluffton 6 (Frazier 3, Lowry 3). Team fouls: Socastee 13, Bluffton 13. Fouled out: None. Technical fouls: None.

• Records: Socastee (14-9); Bluffton (18-4).

The Island Packet’s Chip Cox contributed to this report