For 38 years, local basketball teams have participated in the TimesDaily Classic, and this season’s edition recently took place in Florence with the Russellville Golden Tigers finding success on the court.

Thunderstorms Dec. 16 caused the event to get underway a day later than expected, but on the following evening, Russellville defeated the Colbert Heights Wildcats by a 69-51 score at Coffee Gym.

RHS jumped out to a 26-16 first quarter lead and held an 11-point advantage at the half.

Ten Golden Tigers got into the scoring column during the contest. Chandler Dyas led Russellville in scoring with 19 points, while Jeb Bishop also scored in double figures with 11.

Boots McCulloch finished with eight, while Nathaniel Trussell and Brooks Scott scored seven points apiece. Levi Gist and Jamaal Hubbard added six points each, while Nathan Brockway finished with four. Cam Bonn had two, and Samuel Pace scored one.

Sheffield was the opponent for the Golden Tigers in round two, held Dec. 18 at Coffee Gym. Russellville got the win over the Bulldogs by a 50-42 score, and the victory was the fifth straight on the season for RHS.

Both teams got off to a slow start on the offensive end of the floor, with SHS holding a slim 9-8 lead at the end of the first period. Russellville followed that up with another eight-point quarter, and the Golden Tigers held the opponent to five points in the second to take a 16-14 lead into the halftime break.

The action heated up in the last two quarters, and RHS outdid the Bulldogs in the fourth by a 17-13 tally.

Dyas led Russellville with 20 points in the win.

The semifinals were held Dec. 19 at Flowers Hall on the campus of the University of North Alabama. Russellville faced the 7A Florence Falcons in the second game of the night after Deshler defeated Red Bay, and the Golden Tigers fell by an 82-54 score.

Dee Beckwith of Florence led all scorers with 24 after scoring 17 points in the first half. Dyas was hot early in the contest and scored 16 in the game’s first quarter for Russellville (7-3). Dyas added two points in the second period and with 1:45 remaining before the half, and he had 18 of

Russellville’s 28 points, but he was held scoreless the rest of the way as FHS pulled away for the win.

“I’m very proud of our guys,” said Russellville head coach Patrick Odom after the game. “It has been a fun week. Obviously, it’s special anytime you get to the semifinals of this tournament and get to play here. We knew that we had our hands full tonight, and I thought for a half, we did what we had to do.”