The area high school basketball slate is always light in late December, with a few teams participating in holiday tournaments across the state. In fact, Griffin High’s boys and girls teams recently split a pair of games in the Lamar County Christmas Tournament in Barnesville.

Griffin Christian High and Spalding High will be the next two teams to participate in holiday basketball tournaments. The GCHS teams will travel to Americus to play in the Southland Tournament today through Friday while the Spalding boys and girls travel to Roberta, Ga. to participate in the J.B. Hawkins Tournament Thursday and Friday, Dec. 29-30.

The Crusaders (7-3) and Lady Crusaders (1-9) of GCHS will start their tournament with the GC girls playing the homestanding Lady Raiders of Southland Academy today at 4 p.m. followed by the GISA Class AAA No. 5 state-ranked Crusaders playing the Raiders at 5:30 p.m. Both GC teams will then face Windsor Academy of Macon on Thursday (girls game at 1 p.m., boys - 2:30 p.m.) and Sherwood Christian Academy of Albany on Friday (girls at 10 a.m., boys - 11:30 a.m.).

“This should be a good tournament,” Lady Crusaders head coach and AD David Hammond said. “The Sherwood boys team split with LaGrange Academy earlier in the season, so our boys will probably have a battle with them.”

Spalding will try to win the Hawkins Tournament for the second time in three years. The Spalding boys and girls will start the tournament Thursday with Crawford County High (girls at 7 p.m., boys - 8:30 p.m.) and those games will be followed on Friday by either the winner or the loser of the Thursday afternoon contests between Southwest Macon and Central Macon. If Spalding’s teams win their first games, they will play in the championship games Friday at 7 and 8:30 p.m. If they lose against Crawford, they will play in the third place games at 4 and 5:30 p.m. on Friday.

The Lady Jags (3-7) finished third in the tourney last season, losing their first game by one point and winning the second game. Crawford County (2-5) features 6-1 post player Ivey Slaughter and Lady Jags head coach Demetrius King said his mission is to stop Slaughter and let her teammates try to beat the Lady Jags.

“I think if we put pressure on her, it will be a long night for Crawford,” King said. “We practiced pretty hard last week, even scrimmaging our 9th grade and JV boys teams. I think we’ll be ready.”

The Spalding boys (3-7) have won three straight games and first-year head coach Terry White said he hopes his team continues its good run this week before Region 4-AAA play starts in the new year.

“Our plan is to win two games and get that trophy. We’ve had good practices since our win in the Wilkinson County tournament and I feel we’re improving each time we step on the court. I believe we’ll play well.”