You’ll have to zoom in real close to find the Grovetown boys basketball team on the Georgia radar this year, and that’s exactly how Warriors coach Darren Douglas likes it.
Of course, where Grovetown is situated now ahead of Wednesday night’s 7 p.m. first round Class AAAAAA state tournament game against Rockdale — Region 2-AAAAAA champion with a No. 1 seed in the state bracket — looks familiar based on recent success, this season didn’t really start off that way.
After Douglas’ 2022 squad won the Class AAAAAA state title, and after stars like Derrion Reid — now a 5-star prospect on his way to Alabama for college — were born, Grovetown basketball was all the rage.
Nationally ranked at one point. A steady line of college coaches streaming through the school’s hallways looking to poach from the talent. Constant media attention galore.
Then, after graduation of several college-bound seniors, and just before the 2023-24 season began, Reid moved to Northern California to play his senior season at Prolific Prep. And suddenly, the once-ballyhooed Grovetown roster looked like it was stocked with a bunch of no-names.
It didn’t help that this young, inexperienced group started this season by losing four of its first five games. It took Grovetown until after the New Year to string together its first winning streak. That began on Dec. 29 with a 59-49 win over a team from North Carolina called Heritage and went on for nine games until Grovetown experienced back-to-back close losses while traveling 600 miles in a three-day span on the road at Glynn Academy and Effingham County.
Believe it or not, it was those two losses — not the nine wins — that made Douglas begin to see what kind of team he had.
“At Glynn, we got a bad whistle and they beat us by two,” Douglas said. “They shot 28 more free throws than we did. It was a 10-hour drive — five hours there and back on a bus that wouldn’t go faster than 55 miles per hour. Then we turn around and go all the way back to Effingham. Our guys’ legs were tired. We were frustrated. I kinda told myself then that whatever we get from this year, it’s gonna have to come from the guys themselves.”
That’s when Douglas shifted his coaching approach from a command-focused method to “stepping out of the way, mentoring and guiding.”
LIVING UNDER THE RADAR
Things came full circle, starting with the Jan. 30 game at Lakeside — a 62-53 Grovetown victory.
“I saw those guys huddled up right before that game,” Douglas said. “They talked among themselves and motivated themselves, then they went out there and imposed their will defensively. I looked at Wes, my assistant, and said, ‘if we defend like this, we’ll be fine. If we share the ball like this, we’ll be fine.’”
Grovetown (19-9) hasn’t lost since, including getting some get-back against Glynn Academy with a 16-point win just before the region tournament, and then powering through the region bracket by beating Brunswick by 28 and Evans, in the championship game, by 21.
Still, if it seems like no one’s talking about this Grovetown squad, that’s because it’s true, and Douglas says it sounds and feels very familiar.
“It’s really not much different than the year we won the state title,” Douglas said. “Actually, last year was the anomaly. Last year was the circus. The year we won, nobody talked about us. We weren’t even ranked the entire season. I like where we’re at right now.”
In a season where there aren’t any real, standout superpower squads in Class AAAAAA, aside from maybe top-ranked Alexander (26-2) which is on Grovetown’s side of the bracket, it wouldn’t be the most surprising thing to see Grovetown make a deep run.
In fact, this bunch reminds Douglas of another championship squad he coached.
“In my eight years of coaching, this is my second favorite team,” he said. “The 2018 team at Aquinas was my favorite. And they were like we are now, too. Not many paying attention to us. Nobody cared who scored as long as the team scored.”
That Aquinas squad won the Class A state title that year without an overly stacked roster of highly regarded recruiting prospects, but it did have a kid named Tre Gomillion. After his time starring at Aquinas, he went on to have a solid career at Missouri.
Fast forward to 2024 and Douglas sees a lot of that Aquinas team in this current Grovetown squad.
“Tre was one of those kids who was really good, but he, like that whole Aquinas team, also was a kid that does what we ask, had good parents who don’t interfere with what we do. We have something very similar at Grovetown this year.”
Douglas mentioned senior point guard Zay Howard. The 6-foot-3 senior is just a few assists away from averaging a triple-double. His 17 points, 11 boards and 9.3 assists per game helps fuel a Grovetown offense that prides itself more on team scoring than depending on one or two individuals to carry the entire load.
MAKING AN ENJOYABLE RUN
It’s that team-first approach that makes being around this Grovetown bunch so enjoyable for the coach.
“We live in such a fame and attention based world now, and sometimes that stuff gets into your program deep, and we had to push that out,” Douglas said. “I don’t like that around the program. You can’t coach that. But it’s so fun when you can come to practice and you don’t have guys who seem to feel like they’re trying to play for other things than just Grovetown. Things just clicked and we started winning games.
“We’re sharing the ball more, not worrying about who scores as long as Grovetown scores. Everybody touches the ball. Everybody values defense. That stuff’s not sexy. It doesn’t get you a lot of attention, but it gets you a lot of wins.”
Aside from Howard, Douglas is high on 7-foot sophomore Kevin Curtis.
“His name will probably ring out a lot next year,” Douglas said. “He’s blocking shots. Rim protection. A very solid player.”
He also mentioned 6-foot-6 senior Robert Johnson along with junior guard Marques Dobbs, 6-foot-5 senior Laithen Mitchell who “shoots the ball very well for his size,” and 6-foot-2 junior guard Ahmari Jackson whom Douglas says is “coming into his own.”
Grovetown took its first step toward a state title Wednesday night after defeating Rockdale 55-43 at home in first round action. The Warriors will next face North Atlanta in the second round after North Atlanta (12-15) defeated Houston County also on Wednesday night.
Win that one, and it could set up an Elite Eight clash with No. 1 Alexander next week. The Cougars looked the part of a top-ranked team as it upended Gainesville 70-47 in its first round game Wednesday night.
But Douglas isn’t looking that far ahead. Instead, he’s focusing on enjoying the ride, and he wants his team to continue enjoying each other.
“These guys are just fun to watch, and not just on the basketball court,” he said. “They take care of each other. They spend time with each other away from the game. They like each other, and it feels good for us to just get it all the way back to that.”
