February 9 at Gainesville HS gymnasium in Gainesville, GA
It certainly looked as though Flowery Branch would pull the upset and keep the No. 2 seed from the state playoffs. The Falcons led 34-23 a couple minutes into the third quarter, but Salem's Brandon Smith scored 16 of his team-high 21 points in the second half and his team survived, 55-51 in the quarterfinals of the Region 8-AAAAA Tournament.
Salem secured a state tournament slot with the win, its fifth such appearance in six seasons.
Smith had to pick up a ton of slack with leading scorer Michael Green suspended for the next two games, and he did just that.
Salem went up for the first time since 2-0 when Marcell Small's put back made it a 41-39 game with six minutes to play. Smith followed with two steals, the last of which he turned into a lay-up, and later he converted an extremely-difficult fade away along the baseline for two more points.
With the game tied at 51-51, Smith hit two free throws with 25 seconds left to put Salem up for good.
Chandler Davis, a Lynchburg College (Virginia) signee in football, added 15 points for the victorious Seminoles.
* Nice night also for Flowery Branch guard John Mills, who scored a game-high 23 points. Over the final 2 1/2 minutes, Mills hit the last of his four 3-pointers and assisted on a long ball from Gabe Holston, which evened things up prior to Smith's free throws.
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