The Fannin County Middle School eighth grade girls ended their final middle school game as winners December 17 at Fannin high school’s gym 34-27.
Winning the Mountain League Championship in 2024 as seventh graders, the Lady Rebels defeated Lumpkin County Thursday to capture back to back titles and were crowned the 2025 eighth grade girls Mountain League champions.
““I am super proud of them for growing up through the adversary that we had at the end part of the season. Part of the season, we only had four eighth graders playing in a couple of games, so the seventh graders stepped up and helped those eighth graders get to where we were. I am proud of them for being able to work through that and play together as a team and being coachable. They executed what I asked,” said Head Coach Natasha Anderson.
Fannin had a couple of injured players, Ryann King and Bailee Rhodes, who didn’t play the past couple of weeks, but returned for this game. The last time the Lady Rebels played this Lumpkin team, they gave the Lady Rebels their only loss of the season.
“We didn’t go in there thinking it was going to be easy. We knew it was going to be a battle and everything that had happened to the team, but they rallied together and gave their best effort at the last game, Anderson said.
The game was all Fannin from the first quarter. Fannin led 9-3 at the buzzer. Rhodes’ return was huge. She started the scoring with a three-pointer. She hit another one later in the quarter. Gracie Gray also hit one from downtown late in the quarter.
Fannin kept the offensive pressure on in the second quarter. Annie Dockery scored six of the eight Fannin points in the quarter. King provided the other two points. Fannin led 17-7 at halftime.
Lumpkin came out of the locker room aggressive in the third quarter. The visitors hit four from downtown to score 12 points in the quarter. However, Fannin scored eight points including a three-pointer and free throw from King. Gray added four more points to her total. Fannin never lost the lead and ended the third on top 25-19.
Rhodes hit another three-pointer in the fourth quarter, Gray added a layup and two free throws, and Dockery added a jumper to give Fannin nine fourth quarter points. In the quarter, Fannin’s defense of Sophie Price, King, Rhodes, Hadlee Paterson, and Gray held Lumpkin to eight points. Gray ended the game with 11 points and was 2-for-4 from the free throw line. Rhodes had nine points while Dockery had eight and King had six.