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BIRMINGHAM – The most historic basketball season in the Dothan Wolves’ brief existence came to a halt Thursday morning.
The Wolves couldn’t overcome a nine-minute scoring drought in the first half in falling to the Hoover Buccaneers 53-41 in a Class 7A state semifinal game at the BJCC Legacy Arena. The 41 points were a season-low for Dothan, whose previous low was 45 against Enterprise in an area tournament championship win.
Dothan, which formed through consolidation four years ago, finished the season with a 27-5 record. The 27 wins are the most in the Wolves history and Thursday’s state semifinal was the first in their brief history. “It was a very successful season this year – a historic season, winning an area championship and going as far as we did,” junior Mehaki Menefee said. “It means a lot to our team. I am glad I got to share it with my teammates.” People are also reading… The loss didn’t put a damper on the season, said coach Jeremy Bynum, who was in his first year with the program. “First of all, this was not the outcome we wanted in this game, but I am extremely proud of my guys,” Bynum said. “It is like I just told them in the locker room – I came in in June and they had no kind of connection or relationship to me at all, but it was evident from the first day that they wanted to be great. “They never questioned anything we did. I put them through the ringer and they bought into my philosophy of conditioning and we would play defense along with just working hard. Now, they understand what it takes to get to this. “Looking at these guys crushed like that was tough and to see them feel like that all the work they put in went down the drain, but that was not the case. We will go home to Dothan and there are a lot of people who are proud of them.” Meanwhile, Hoover advanced to Saturday’s championship game against either Central of Phenix City or Spain Park. The Buccaneers seek their first state title since 2015. Senior Thomas Dowd, a Troy signee who was recently selected to play for Alabama in the Alabama-Mississippi All-Star Game, led Dothan with 17 points and nine rebounds. Menefee followed with 13 points, but the Wolves got only 11 points from the rest of the players. The Buccaneers were led by guards Jarrett Fairly with 17 points and Elijah Herron with 10. Salim London added eight points, eight rebounds and four assists. The Wolves kept the bigger Hoover players in check, including holding 6-foot-9, 245-pound sophomore DeWayne Brown to just six points. Brown did leda Hoover in rebounding with nine boards. “If I had told them that we hold 55 to six points, I would have thought we would have been in good shape,” Bynum said. “We put our focus on 55 and their guards came in and got inside of us.” After trailing most of the game by double digits, the Wolves made a charge late in the third and early in the fourth quarter. The Wolves sliced a 16-point deficit to 10 by the end of the third quarter and cut it to 40-32 early in the fourth on a Menefee foul line jumper. The Wolves had an opportunity to pull within five when Dowd fired up a long-range 3-pointer in front of the Dothan bench, but the shot bounced off the rim – the first of five straight missed 3-pointers for the Wolves. Brown scored down low and Herron hit a 3-pointer to boost the margin back to 13 with 3:02 left and Dothan couldn’t recover. Poor shooting for the Wolves combined with solid offensive flow by Hoover in the first half proved to be decisive. After a 3-pointer by Menefee from the top of the key with 5:33 left in the first quarter sliced Hoover’s lead to 6-5, the Wolves didn’t score again until a putback by Dowd with 4:10 to go in the second quarter. During the stretch of 9:13 in between, the Wolves missed 14 straight shots, had two turnovers and missed a one-and-one free throw. Dothan finished the opening half at 23 percent shooting , including just 8 percent on 3-point efforts . The Buccaneers, who hovered around 50 percent shooting most of the day, capitalized to pull out to an 18-5 lead. “When we first came out, they kind of sat down in the paint,” Bynum said of the Bucs zone defense. “My guys weren’t expecting it because on all the film they were pressuring and it made us start thinking and we were hesitant. “They are one of the biggest teams we have played and they kind of shrunk the floor on us. This is our first time being on this stage and I think – I wouldn’t say shell-shocked – but we were playing hesitant, not wanting to make a mistake.” The Buccaneers, who have six players at 6-foot-4 or better, didn’t allow Dothan to penetrate, forcing outside shots. DHS fired up 30 3-point shots out of their 55 total attempts. The Wolves were only able to make four of those 30 tries . Dothan was able to rebound close with the taller Bucs, losing the battle of the boards only 33-30 but couldn’t overcome its early shooting woes. “The height issue was more a factor in us going to the goal in finishing,” Bynum said. “How many points in the paint did we have? Twenty points. We are a drive, create space and get in the paint type team. We didn’t have much dribble penetration because of their length.” The Bucs increased the lead to 16 before Dothan finished the half on a 7-2 run, making it 27-16 Hoover at the halftime break. Braxton Hornsby hit two free throws and a fastbreak layup after a steal and Menefee earned an old-fashion 3-point play off a basket in the lane and a free throw in the flurry. Hoover popped the lead back to 16 on two occasions in the third quarter, the last at 35-19. However, two Dowd 3-pointers helped the Wolves bring the margin down to 10 with 2:10 go in the third. Entering the fourth, the Wolves trailed 40-30 and quickly cut it to eight before the Buccaneers pulled back out to a comfortable lead they held the rest of the way. After its slow start, Dothan finished the game at 29.1 percent from the floor after hitting 34 percent in the second half . Hoover finished at 47.6 percent . “We lost two games in a row in December and we went on a 13-game winning streak,” Dowd said, reflecting on the season. “I have never played team basketball like that before. It was a humbling experience for me and a great experience. It almost changes the way you look at basketball – these guys are my family. It is not just people I play with, but family.”David Mundee Follow David Mundee Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today
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