COVINGTON, Ga. — In a tough, physical battle on both sides of the floor, it was the Newton Rams who prevailed 59-47 over the Archer Tigers Wednesday night at home. 

When the final buzzer sounded, students and fans stormed the court in celebration of Newton’s advancement to the Final Four of the Class 7A state playoffs. 

Head coach Charlemagne Gibbons was grateful to see his team move on in the state tournament. 

“We got more days to play in our season,” Gibbons said. “Everybody, except for one team, is going to cry when the season is over. For us, we get a chance to continue to be that team and live to fight another day on Saturday.” 

Every basket was highly contested and tough to come by for both teams Wednesday night. Early on, neither team gave up anything easy, forcing numerous turnovers and causing one another to make mistakes. 

That seemed to be the story in the first half. 

When the second half commenced, however, the Rams seemed to penetrate their way to the paint more effectively.

Specifically, in the third quarter, Newton scored 12 of its 17 third quarter points in the paint. ⅓ of those points came courtesy of Miokaye Grant in the post. 

Gibbons highlighted how feeding the ball down low in the paint was intentional coming out of halftime. 

“Our post guys are good,” Gibbons said. “Tonight, we made a concerted effort in the second half to put that basketball in our post players’ hands.” 

Newton pulled away further from Archer in the final frame of action outscoring the Tigers 19-12. MJ Whitlock helped seal the win down the stretch going 6-for-7 at the free-throw line, too. 

Whitlock finished with a team-high 20 points. Jakai Newton tallied 13 points while Stephon Castle had nine and Marquavious Brown contributed eight. 

Gibbons believes that his team’s willingness to share the ball and their unselfish play is what give the Rams the best chance to continue advancing in the state tournament. 

“If you’re going to be a championship-caliber team, sometimes you gotta go to the other guy,” Gibbons said. “Everybody’s not willing to do that. The sacrifice these guys make for each other in order to win, I think you saw that tonight. Those guys in that locker room are about winning.” 

As a result of Wednesday’s win, the Rams will move on to the Final Four of the Class 7A state playoffs. They face Norcross High School at Buford City Arena on Saturday, March 5 with tip-off being 8 p.m.