Spartans save best for last, win state title
BIRMINGHAM – Bucky McMillan’s dad was right.
Sean Elmore went off.
Elmore knocked down a trifecta of 3-pointers in the final 3:19 of the third quarter, propelling Mountain Brook into a runaway fourth quarter, as the Spartans captured their third state championship in school history with a 63-43 win over Auburn on Saturday afternoon in the Class 7A State Finals at the BJCC’s Legacy Arena.
“It’s funny because my dad, who has watched every single game we’ve ever played in my time here, texted me this morning, ‘I’ve got a feeling Sean Elmore’s about to go off,’” said McMillan, the coach behind each of Mountain Brook’s three state titles in 2013, 2014 and 2017.
The prophecy proved true, and Mountain Brook played one of its best quarters of the season’s entirety in its final eight minutes.
Auburn cut the Mountain Brook lead to 38-34 in the opening seconds of the fourth quarter, before the Spartans found an extra gear and accelerated rapidly to the finish line. Mountain Brook went on a 21-3 run in the following six minutes, wrapping up the state title with a thunderous stomp.
“I don’t know if that was our best, but that second half was pretty dang close to our best,” McMillan said. “Our guys played great.”
Before Elmore got hot late in the third, Mountain Brook’s lead was just four and 38-32 at the conclusion of the third quarter, but the momentum garnered from those shots set the stage for the fourth-quarter spree.
“That gave us a lot of energy, making shots, but most importantly, making stops on defense, getting rebounds. Those shots just boost us,” Elmore said.
Elmore scored 17 points in the game, including 5-of-8 shooting from 3-point distance.
The game boiled down to one simple point for Elmore and his team.
“Champions make championship plays. It’s as simple as that,” he said.
“He’s such a high-level competitor,” McMillan said of Elmore. “Great competitors love to compete on great stages and great games. The fact that he did this is incredible, but doesn’t surprise me one bit.”
Going into the contest, Mountain Brook’s game plan was to make Auburn play to the Spartans’ desired tempo. Even if that meant sacrificing a few easy baskets, McMillan wanted to speed the pace of the game.
That plan worked, as Mountain Brook was able to dump the clutch and speed away in the fourth.
“The fourth quarter was a result of the first three,” McMillan said. “We came out in the game, and our plan was to trap to get the game up and down, regardless of if they got easy points.
“When we got the pace going in that game, you saw our guys were used to playing that way every day in practice. Our guys were in a very comfortable place in the fourth quarter and were very strong.”
Trendon Watford was Trendon Watford in the championship game, notching another double-double and leading all players with 26 points and 11 rebounds on 11-of-17 shooting.
Watford’s impressive stat line was not his most impressive feat of the night. Slowing down Mississippi State signee Garrison Brooks was.
Brooks was held to just 11 points and a pair of rebounds for the entirety of the game, well below his average in both columns.
“When we scouted them, we noticed that he averaged five offensive rebounds and ten rebounds a game, so that was a key focus of ours, to try to keep him off the glass,” Watford said.
As the Spartans pulled away in the fourth quarter, the mood on the Mountain Brook bench became more jovial by the minute.
“It was so fun,” Watford said. “As I saw the lead keep going up, it just kept getting better. It took a lot of pressure off me and my team.”
Neither team led by more than a pair for the entirety of the first half, as the Spartans held a 12-10 lead after a quarter of play and 23-21 at the halftime break. Watford’s layup with 5:47 to play in the third quarter gave Mountain Brook a 29-25 edge.
Ben McCool played the role of Mountain Brook’s most productive senior all season, and finished his career in the green and gold with 10 points, three steals, two assists and a block. Jack Brewster, Jeb Brown, Jackson Lightfoot and Sam Colvin all played in the final games of their high school careers.