Holly Hill basketball teams await Class A state tournament selections

Holly Hill – You’ve heard of the short story “Man Without A Country"? Holly Hilly

Academy’s basketball teams are the teams without a region – the girls for certain and the boys can be

debated.

Holly Hill is the only school in SCISA Region 1-Class A to have a girls team. There are only

three boys teams, Ragin Prep and Crown Leadership being the others.

The Holly Hill boys were 7-13 on the season, while the Lady Raiders were 4-13. Both teams are

waiting to see if they’ve done enough to earn berths in the Class A state tournaments.

“I think we have done more than enough to make state and get a decent seed,” said boys head

coach Justin Gillam. “The record doesn’t stand out, but we haven’t backed down from playing anyone

that wanted to put us on their schedule. We’ve played multiple AAA teams and we’re 3-3.”

Senior Jody “Boogey” Gillam, the coach’s son, leads in scoring with a 26.8 per game average,

assists at 3.7 and steals at 3.5. He also averages 4.4 rebounds.

“Boogey’s biggest strength is he makes everyone around him a better player,” said Coach Gillam,

who has 10 seniors and one sophomore on his roster. “He’s got a very high basketball IQ, so he’s

basically our coach on the floor.”

Ashton Soles, who has been sidelined with an injury, had a 10.9 scoring average and a team high

7.7 rebounds. Ethan Siau is averaging 8.3 points, Mason Connor 5.2 points and 5.9 rebounds and

sophomore Tyler Green 4.2 rebounds.

Other members of the team are Camdin Harmon, Brayden Mizell and Connor Teague.

Girls head coach Heath Prescott is uncertain if his team has done enough to make state, but he

does know his players have put forth tremendous effort to this point.

“Right before Christmas break senior center Kaylee Brabham went down in practice with an

ankle injury which ended up costing her the whole season,” Prescott said. “Then right after Christmas

break junior Peyton Strickland had an injury that finished her for the rest of the season too. So this year's

team has played above my expectations with our injuries to two upperclassmen and having to pull up

junior varsity players to fill the void areas.”

The starting lineup for the girls includes junior Kaley Bell and seventh-grader Milly Kate

Prescott at the guards, sophomore Kloie Mizell at small forward, sophomore Essie Wolpert at power

forward and senior Chloe Wren at center.

Prescott, the coach’s daughter, leads in scoring at 9.9 and assists at 1.9 while grabbing 5.0

rebounds and picking up 2.3 steals. Bell leads in steals at 2.6 while averaging 4.1 points.

Wolpert is the leading rebounder at 5.8, matching a 5.8 scoring average. She also has 2.2 steals.

Wren averages 4.1 rebounds and 1.5 points, and Mizell averages 2.8 points and 3.4 rebounds.

Coming off the bench are eighth-grader Caitlyn Crisp, sophomore Taylor Wright, junior

Kaylee Eken, sophomore Kaylee Cuttino and eighth-grader Bailey Stanley.