2005 Newton County

From 9-7-14

When the 2005 season started at Newton high School, I thought it would be my last team, ever, to coach, & I wanted it to be a successful year. (I found out years ago that the season is about the players---& not the coach!)

With 5 seniors on the team, I knew it would be an "easy sell" to convince the players that this year would be important to them. We had another uphill battle to face as we ventured into a new region which was loaded with great teams & outstanding players which colleges were lined up to recruit! Our seniors, John Monk, Todd Hoskins, Rudy Nolley, Brandon Finch, & Trent Brown, were all fundamentally-sound & well-disciplined basketball players. We had one other real advantage with this team, Jr. Jerrell Boswell, could be counted on to score 20+ points! as he was a "scoring machine"! In our opening game of the season, we blasted Rockdale Co. 85-46, as Boswell scored 31 pts. (a total which he would exceed on 5 other occasions)! We entered January with a 9-3 record, & we were confident we could compete in this tough region! (As we boarded the bus to travel to Redan, I couldn't help but think of how proud I was to have a team dressed in sharp-looking travel outfits!). My thoughts ran to the person, Becky Rutledge, who had made all these outfits possible since my return to NCHS. (She has since continued this tradition for over a decade.) The Redan trip provided us with one of the biggest wins of the season, over the top-ranked team, 65-60. Late in the season we travelled to Lithonia with a 14-4 record & had a terrific comeback win. Trailing 68-54 after 3 qtrs., Boswell scored his season-high 41 pts., & Hoskins had his best game as he was 7/11 from the field, & 10/11 from the free-throw line, for a total of 24 pts., as our come-back win was one of the best of the season. We finished the season with a 16-8 record & were seeded 3rd going into the Region Tournament. (To be continued---)