Clover heads to 2nd straight state title game, ending Rock Hill season in heartbreak
Clover is now one win away from redemption.
The Blue Eagles defeated Rock Hill, 55-38, on Monday night at Northwestern High School in Rock Hill — ensuring its presence in its second straight 5A state championship game. The team, which fell four points short of a title last year, will play Sumter at USC Aiken on Friday at 12 p.m.
The trip will mark the program’s fourth state title trip since the 1934-35 season, per South Carolina High School League records, and their second in as many seasons. A win there would be the program’s first state championship victory.
“They’re an amazing group,” Clover head coach Sherer Hopkins said of her team postgame. “And, you know, we still have another goal to accomplish.”
Aylesha Wade, a UNC-Charlotte basketball commit, was amazing in her own right Monday night — like she had been all year. She led all scorers with 23 points despite missing six free throws and handled Rock Hill’s unrelenting pressure like the senior of a state-bound team should.
Speaking through a mask, her voice still hoarse from the excitement, she told reporters she remembered last year well.
“I remember that day,” Wade said, referencing a picture she posted on Twitter of her crouching down on the Columbia Life Arena floor in defeat. “The caption was, ‘I’ll never feel like this again.’ And mark my words, I won’t. We’re going to do what we got to do to bring it back to Clover.”
The ball, fittingly, was in her hands at the buzzer. She threw the ball in the air after time expired and roared to the Clover crowd — a group that came out en masse and appeared to make Clover the “away” team in name only.
“Clover, I mean, it’s no surprise,” Wade said. “Every time we play at home or we travel in the playoffs, our city is there to have our back, and it means so much to the program and to the team. But it’s no surprise that they showed up the way they did.”
Clover wouldn’t be denied a chance to tie up the loose ends of March 2020: It jumped out early by virtue of a 10-0 run that spanned the end of the first quarter and the beginning of the second. Then, after starting forward La’Destiny Worthy and Wade had to sit out a substantial part of the first half because of foul trouble, Clover didn’t waver.
And that’s even when Rock Hill turned up the full-court pressure — the only discernible edge the undersized Bearcats had in the matchup.
“We have a very strong team, and when things like foul trouble happen to Aylesha or whomever, we know we have somebody who can step up and fill that spot,” Hopkins said. “We weathered that (second-quarter) storm, and I’m proud of them.”
Clover entered the break up, 27-18, after a Rock Hill guard Jada Jones coast-to-coast layup finish right before the halftime buzzer.
In the second half — despite Rock Hill head coach Kenny Orr pulling several tricks up his proverbial sleeve, throwing guard after guard in the game for a fresh defense — Clover’s guards proved too experienced and its forwards too mighty: There were possessions that Clover would get two or three offensive rebounds before scoring.
The game didn’t get within one possession in the second half.
In addition to Wade, Clover (17-1) was helped by Teagan Bertwell, who scored 10 points; Lauren Deal, who scored eight points including two threes that put to rest Rock Hill’s second and final real comeback chance; Worthy, who scored seven; Janelle Carter, who scored three and took a bulk of the responsibility of guarding Rock Hill starting guard Jada Jones; and Ashley Farmer, who scored four.
Rock Hill (20-3) was led by Laila Hankerson, who scored 16 points and Jones, who scored 13. Ashlee Creque scored five points, and Grace Wilson and Alana Hankerson each scored two.
Battle of the two guards
Before she left the gym after the victory, Wade had something to say.
Orr told reporters through tears postgame that Wade wanted to make sure to offer personal congratulations to Rock Hill junior starting guard, Jada Jones. In a special moment, before the players left to their families, Orr hugged them both and shared a few words with each of them.
“Me, Jada and Aylesha, our relationship goes back through the summers and stuff at the (Rock Hill Sports and) Event Center and different things,” the Rock Hill coach said.
The three of them worked together as scorekeepers on the weekends while the center hosted AAU tournaments, he said.
“I always call them ‘my two favorite No. 12s.’ You can’t ask for two better kids, two harder workers, two kids who give it their all every time on that court,” Orr said.
He added: “Aylesha just gave Jada some good advice, you know. And how many other players would do that? Not too many. She just wanted Jada to come out and talk before she left.”
Before joining the parents and fans of Rock Hill players waiting for the Bearcats to trickle out of the teary-eyed locker room, Orr wiped some tears of his own away and added how much he loved this particular team — and how much he’ll miss coaching his four seniors (Ashlee Creque, Dahlia Bell, Madison Burgess and Shamyah Patterson).
“I’m happy for Clover,” Orr said. “Coach Hopkins, she runs a great program. I love Aylesha Wade. ... I’m extremely happy for them.
“I’m a little sad to lose, but if we’re going to lose to anybody, this is the program I want to lose to.”
This story was originally published March 1, 2021 at 9:48 PM.
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