Bbyers@heraldonline.com

It’s almost like someone took a hatchet to the basketball playoff brackets and knocked off as many local teams as possible.

It looked good when the playoffs started on Monday with 11 local teams.

But the first-round blues eliminated six teams and only five are left heading into the weekend.

First up tonight are a pair of Class AAAA games.

Northwestern’s girls host J.L. Mann and South Pointe’s boys host T.L. Hanna after moving its game from Saturday to tonight.

There should be some outstanding games on Saturday such as the Rock Hill’s boys, coming off a big 60-55 win over Gaffney in overtime, go to Hillcrest.

The others are Chester at Lower Richland in the Class AAA boys playoffs, and Greenville Tech at Indian Land in Class A boys.

Rock Hill suffered through a small slump at the end but still finished with at 19-7 record.

But perhaps their win over defending Class AAAA state champ Gaffney on Wednesday put other teams around the state on noice that the Bearcats are ready to make a long run toward the championship game in Columbia.

“The playoffs go so fast that it’s hard to stop and celebrate one win,” Rock Hill coach Eric Rollings said.

“Beating last year’s champion was big for us, but now we have to turn around and go against Hillcrest, who didn’t get to be No. 2 by not being good.’’

The Bearcats are one of the taller teams in the state, led by all-state player Jaylen Reid at forward.

The Bearcats also start 6-5 forward Roderick Howell, 6-4 forward Detonate Fleming, 6-0 guard Nate Motley and 5-8 guard Vincent Walker.

If the Bearcats want to go larger, the can send in their sixth man, 6-7 post Jaleel Scott.

Barry Byers 329-4099