The Decatur Daily has a nice article about Coach Garris today, pick up a copy.
The rest is history.
Elkmont didn’t disappoint. Garris’ gritty team consistently found ways to win close games, putting together one of the best seasons in the program’s history, with the Red Devils advancing to the Class 3A Northwest Regional final for the first time.
Garris, who just completed his second season at Elkmont, is The Decatur Daily’s Class 1A-3A boys basketball coach of the year.
“It was a great year,” Garris said. “We had a group of guys who played hard.They were a tough group who never quit. They did everything we asked out of them, and believe me, I’m not an easy person to play for.”
Garris’ high hopes may have seemed far-fetched to an outside observer in November. The Red Devils end their 2010-11 campaign below .500. That didn’t change the way Garris felt about his team. Garris saw something that many outside the Red Devils’ locker room had overlooked: a group of guys with a deep desire to take Elkmont basketball to new heights.
“We were close last year,” Garris said. “I knew that after we went to Lauderdale County and played them tough (in the 2011 Class 3A sub-regional). After that, with what we had coming back, I knew we could have a pretty good team this season.”
Garris’ premonitions were right. Elkmont proved itself on the floor, earning a reputation as a hard-nosed bunch with a will to succeed. Elkmont opened the season strong, and then closed even stronger, beating Lauderdale County in the sub-regional round of the playoffs before rallying from an 18-point deficit for an overtime victory against Holly Pond in the Northwest Regional semifinals.
Coaching was a major factor. Elkmont had no above-the-rim players. And in most meaningful games, the Red Devils were outmatched in sheer athletic talent. No problem, though.
Basketball fundamentals and sheer determination allowed Elkmont to overcome any shortcomings it had in raw athleticism.
“They were one of the toughest teams we played,” Tanner coach Chris Whitt said. “That was a scrappy bunch. They would fight you tooth and nail. Those guys didn’t back down, and a lot of that had to do with Garth.”
Garris is a veteran coach, even though he has been an Elkmont for only two seasons. He enjoyed a successful tenure at East Limestone in the 1990s before leaving to take an administrative position at Madison County. That experience showed in how Garris managed his team. He adjusted to the Red Devils’ skill sets, which meant playing more zone defense and feeding the ball inside on offense to big center Dan Logan. Logan, a 6-foot-0, 216-pound center with a yellow mohawk, thrived in Garris’ system, averaging 12 points and seven rebounds a game.
The rest of the Elkmont’s starters weren’t far off, either. The Red Devils had four starters, including Cole Glass, Hayden Huseth and Skyler Gant, with scoring lines that were basically identical.
“No matter the situation, our guys played hard,” Garris said. “They had to play hard to win. We had five seniors who bought in and played hard every night. We never lacked in effort. Now, make no mistake, we wanted to go farther. We wanted to be in Birmingham (for the state Final Four). But those guys did great things for Elkmont basketball. They accomplished a lot.”
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