Southfield A&T Women’s Basketball Reach State Finals

The 2018-2019 Southfield A&T women’s basketball team had high aspirations from the beginning of the season. Now, they’ve lived up to the hype; as the season winds down, the Warriors finished the regular season 20-1. Finishing with the #1 rank in the state in class A, now they shift gears to the championship. With 5
playoff games won in the postseason, Southfield has a chance to make history once again.

Under legendary Coach Michelle Marshall the Warriors have been to the final 4 two of the past three years. This year they played Muskegon in the semifinal game. Before the day of the game the team, coaches, and managers were celebrated during the school’s pep rally as a send off for our players!

Finally, Friday had arrived for the semifinal game and everyone was excited about it. The game had a fast start for Southfield building a 29-13 lead at halftime against the Michigan state commit lead Muskegon team. After a strong 4th quarter by the ‘Big Reds’, it wasn’t even to win.

As Southfield A&T prevailed, we moved on to the championship to take on Saginaw Heritage, the defending, state champs. The game Saturday would be for the state championship.  At the beginning of the game, Saginaw Heritage started off hot raining threes from ‘Moe’ Joiner and big baskets inside from Shine Strickland-Giles. For Southfield A&T, it was a rough game as they could not get the offense going as Soleil Barnes led the team in points in the state championship.

The amazing 3-2 zone ran by Saginaw Heritage had
stifled the Southfield A&T offense holding them to a season low 40 points. Saginaw would end up winning 55-40 to earn their second straight division one championship in women’s basketball.

Although the Southfield team lost, they have to keep their heads up  high as they had the best season in Southfield history. This will
definitely never be forgotten at this school or anywhere. The Southfield squad finished the season with a 24-2 record, only losing twice to Saginaw Heritage.