Rochelle — Dooly County High’s Bobcats tried to do Saturday night to Wilcox County’s Patriots what Greenville High had done to them on Friday — snap their winning streak. They failed in the end, but only by the barest of margins, 60-59.

That nail-biter followed a similarly close girls game that ended with the Lady Bobcats prevailing, 39-35, to insure right off the bat the visitors would at least get a split of the twin bill pitting the neighboring rivals.

Both schools will be in action twice this weekend. Wilcox hosts Ciinch on Friday and Hawkinsville on Saturday in 6 p.m. starts while Dooly visits Pacelli at 6 Friday and entertains Central Talbotton at 7 on Saturday.

Patriots 60, Bobcats 59

Their 11-game victory skein halted 24 hours earlier by Greenville’s Region 4-A leading Patriots, the Bobcats did their best to try and keep Wilcox’s current Region 2-A runner-up Patriots from making them their eighth straight victim.

For over half the game, Dooly was in position to do just that as when halftime rolled around it held a 12-point, 38-26 advantage. Just like it had done in the previous meeting between the two when it was unable to protect the 9-point lead it held at the break and eventually lost 66-61, Dooly couldn’t hang on for victory.

Down 48-45 entering the final turn, the Patriots got a clutch trey from Makail Grace and two pressure free throws from Jonathan Howard in the late going to take a three-point lead of their own.

With just four seconds showing on the clock, though, Wilcox committed a foul on a throw-up 3-pointer by Bobcat A.J. Smith who hit his first two gratis tosses but missed the third. The Patriots snared the rebound and held on for its victory.

“I’m proud we won, but we didn’t play as well as we could have,” victorious coach George Kennedy said. “Sometimes, though, your opponent makes you play bad.

“That was at least part of the case in this one as Dooly is one of the top three opponents we’ve faced this season including Coffee, Lowndes and Turner which all have very good teams.

“On the other hand, we have to use our brains a little more rather than just depend on our athletic ability all the time. When you outshoot a team 23-12 in free throw attempts but only outscore them by four from the line, you’re asking for trouble.

“We also need to be more consistent in our scoring as you need to get 15 or more points in every period and not just two quarters as we did in this one. We don’t need to give up 21 points in a quarter either like we did in the second period tonight.”

Johnny Dwight dropped in a career-high 19 points in leading the Patriots’ production for the first time this season. Jonathan Howard hit 15 and Makail Grace netted 13.

Dooly, which was hurt by the number of committed in the game that had considerable contact, was led by A.J. Smith whose 20 points led all scorers. LaParris Hall came up with another 15 in defeat.

Score by Quarters

Dooly County 17-21-10-11 — 59

Wilcox County 13-13-19-15 — 60

Scoring

Dooly County (59) — LaParris Hall 15, Jamari Baker 9, Kerreon Merrell 2, Travoski Lundy, Tracey Linkhorn, Nick Taylor, Ray Adams, Mark Lloyd 2, Devoin Mathis 4, A.J. Smith 20.

Team totals: field goals 24; free throws 7 of 12 (58.3%); fouls 22; 3-pointers — Adams 1, Smith 3; fouled out — Hall.

Wilcox County (60) — Quinn Tisdol, Larry Munford, Makail Grace 13, Calvin Rawls 4, Antwan Benjamin 3, A.J. Benjamin 6, Jonathan Howard 15, Johnny Dwight 19.

Team totals: field goals 24; free throws 11 of 23 (47.8%); fouls 13; 3-pointers — Grace 1; fouled out — none.

Lady Bobcats 39, Lady Patriots 35

In avenging their earlier 52-51 loss to the Lady Patriots, the Lady Bobcats won the scoring battle in each of the first three quarters and played just well enough in the final stanza to hang on for a third victory in their last four starts.

“Really and truly, my girls shocked me considering that we’re playing crippled and everything with a lot of different ailments,” winning coach David Barron said after watching his team lead 14-11, 23-19 and 33-24 at the rest breaks.

“I’m tickled to death we were able to pull out a win despite the fact we didn’t shoot well especially from the free throw line (where Dooly was just 3 of 18).

“Probably the big keys for us were that we rebounded well, ran the break well and got good individual performances from Quanesha (Tookes) who did a good job of directing the attack, and Shy’Lexia who scored (15 points) and rebounded well.” Gereka Sanders netted another 10 points.

Wilcox mentor Santita Coon said several things hurt her team’s performance and led to its seventh straight loss.

“We had a low third-period production (five points); we frequently failed to recover on defense which resulted in several easy baskets for Dooly, and we couldn’t make our free throws in the fourth quarter when we had a chance to pull out the win.”

Score by Quarters

Dooly County 14-9-10-6 — 39

Wilcox County 11-8-5-11 — 35

Scoring

Dooly County (39) — Quanesha Tookes 6, Shanequelin Johnson 4, Gereka Sanders 10, Shy’Lexia Hall 15, Maya Ellison 4, Jessica Hightower, C’nia Felder, Quadesha Tookes.

Team totals: field goals 17; free throws 3 of 18 (16.7%); fouls 17; 3-pointers — Quanesha Tookes 2; fouled out — Sanders, Hightower.

Wilcox County (35) — Dasjia Daniels 3, Tyonna Wright 2, Kadada Martin 4, Santia Lawson 2, Jada Curry 6, Erica Jackson 13, JaMiracle Jones 5, TaKayla Mahoganey.

Team totals: field goals 13; free throws 6 of 20 (30%); fouls 17; 3-pointers — Jackson 2, Martin 1; fouled out — none.