How Gordonsville won its first TSSAA boys basketball state tournament game

MURFREESBORO – Gordonsville returned to the program's first TSSAA boys basketball state tournament in 28 years.

The Tigers walked off the Murphy Center floor at Middle Tennessee State with the program's first state tournament win in school history.

Gordonsville beat Memphis Middle College 49-40 in overtime.

Tristan Wood led all scorers with 19 points on 8-for-13 shooting while Eli Adams added 14 points and seven rebounds for Gordonsville.

Gordonsville (24-10) plays Frank Hughes (25-9) at 2:15 p.m. Friday in a TSSAA Class 1A semifinal. Middle College finishes its season 24-10.

“This just means that we got to keep it going,” Adams said. “We can't just have one game and think we're good, (we’ve) got to keep going.”

Gordonsville fed off the energy from its large crowd that traveled to Murfreesboro.

“What this community has done as far as getting behind this team, they love this team,” Gordonsville coach Gregg Bibb said. “I've said it a million times, they show it in the numbers they come out and not just that, the life that they have and the life that they breathe into us on the floor."

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Gordonsville is a small school of about 350 students, leaving Bibb a small pool of players to pick from, but this group has been together since their youth basketball days.

“I've said this a million times, this is the most connected bunch I've ever had,” Bibb said. “And they love being around each other. They love each other.”

The connection within this Gordonsville group is exactly what they plan to lean on headed into Friday’s semifinal against Frank Hughes.

“We’ve just been playing together for a long time. (We) played together in junior high, junior pro,” Adams said. “It's just great energy between us to keep it going.”