Tanner's Malik Atkins puts up a shot while being defended by Elkmont's Hunter Broadway (2) during Friday night's semifinal game. The Rattlers defeated the Red Devils 54-50.

Tanner dug itself an early hole, but allowed plenty of time to climb out of it and take a 54-50 victory over Elkmont in the semifinals of the Limestone County Tournament.

The Rattlers found themselves down 11-0 in the first three minutes of the Friday night game and trailed 21-13 after one quarter. But they kept chipping away at the lead and eventually overtook the Red Devils for the win.

“We’ve done that a couple times early in the year, where we’d dig ourselves an early hole,” Whitt said. “At Sheffield, we were down 16-1. I think we used that experience to know the game’s not over until the end. They got off to a hot start, especially Layton Smith. He was on fire for a while there. Luckily, we gathered ourselves and settled down a little bit.”

Smith scored 11 points in the first quarter, including hitting three 3-pointers, but only scored four points during the remainder of the game.

“I thought we defended Smith a whole lot better in the second half,” Whitt said. “We didn’t give him much room to get his shot off. The first half, he was on fire.”

Tanner held Elkmont to just six points in the second quarter and closed the gap to 27-24 at halftime. Elkmont was able to hang on to the lead in the third quarter and entered the fourth with a 39-38 advantage.

However, Tanner immediately took the lead with a basket by J.J. Jones in the first 20 seconds of the fourth. The Rattlers expanded that lead with a Malik Atkins basket less than a minute later.

The Rattlers eventually went on a 13-2 run and took their largest lead of the game at 51-41 with 1:39 remaining.

A couple of Tanner turnovers and missed free throws allowed Elkmont the opportunity to come back, but the Red Devils missed three 3-pointers in the final 30 seconds. The last 3-pointer missed with 10 seconds left.

Jones got the rebound and was fouled. He hit one free throw to put Tanner up 54-48 and make a last-second basket by the Red Devils meaningless.

Atkins and Jones led Tanner with 13 points each, while DaShaun McNabb added 12. Jones also had nine rebounds for Tanner.

Elkmont was led by Layton Smith with 15 points and Preston Robinson with 12. Christian Smith had eight points and eight rebounds for the Red Devils.