JACKSONVILLE – It’s been 10 years since the Cherokee County Warriors claimed their only Northeast Regional basketball championship.

On Wednesday, the 2015-16 Warrior team had a chance to add another regional title to the school trophy case, but standing in their way was the team that knocked the Warriors out last year, top-ranked Westminster Christian.

The Wildcats managed to hold eighth-ranked Cherokee County to its lowest offensive output of the season to claim a 36-29 victory. The two teams met earlier this season in the Albertville Christmas Tournament, with the Warriors claiming a 65-51 victory in the tournament semifinals on Dec. 29.

Westminster Christian (28-3) advances to the Class 4A state semifinals in Birmingham on Tuesday against Handley. Cherokee County’s season ends at 25-8.

“Tough game for us,” Warrior head coach Neal Wester said. “We didn’t play well offensively, and of course they had a lot to do with that. They play really good defense and made more shots than we did.”

The past two seasons, the Warriors have relied on the 3-pointer to get their offense rolling. On Wednesday, the Wildcats held Cherokee County to just 3-of-23 3-pointers for the game (10-of-48 shots from the floor overall). Senior sharpshooter Joel Wester was just 2-of-13 from the arc and finished with 13 points.

“When they’re playing you tight, it’s tough to get good looks,” the younger Wester said. “We didn’t get many good looks. We shot a lot, but we really didn’t get many good looks at all.”

Seven of Joel Wester’s points came in the first half. He tied the game at 17 on a bucket and foul shot with 10.9 seconds left before intermission, but the Wildcats’ Trey Petty sank a trey at the buzzer to give Westminster Christian a 20-17 halftime advantage.

The defensive battle continued in the second half. The Wildcats managed to build a 27-22 lead by the end of the third quarter, but the Warriors still managed to hang around. Joel Wester’s second and final trey of the game came with 4:31 remaining, cutting Westminster Christian’s lead to 31-27.

However, that would be the final field goal the Warriors would make as the Wildcats held on down the stretch for the win.

“Every time we play, it’s ugly,” Westminster Christian head coach Ronnie Stapler said. “I thought the first half we really had a chance to spread the game out a little bit, but we got a little selfish and took some one-pass shots. We tried to overpass a little bit. We got to the bucket two or three times and tried to make another pass and got it knocked away or deflected instead of just finishing. But, I thought the whole game we did a good job defensively. I think every bucket they got was a contested bucket. That was our whole deal.”

Stapler said much of the Wildcats’ game plan was to prevent Joel Wester and Quartez Henderson from getting easy baskets.

“If you let them catch the ball in rhythm, they’re really good,” Stapler said. “If they caught it, we just tried to get high hands on them and not let them catch and shoot in rhythm. Make them drive it. Make them put it on the floor to shoot it or make them drive it somewhere and try to shoot it. I think for the most part we did that.

“Joel has such good range. He can shoot it from 25, 26 feet. You’ve got to really press up on him because he’s a big kid. If you don’t get high hands on him, he can shoot it over a smaller guy. I thought we did a good job of making him take tough shots and making Quartez take tough shots.”

Petty earned the Class 4A Northeast Regional Most Valuable Player honor after scoring 16 points and grabbing 14 rebounds for the Wildcats. John Kendall added seven points and five boards. Tysean Whitehead finished with four points, six boards, three blocks and three steals.

Kendall and Whitehead joined Petty from Westminster on the all-tournament team.

Henderson added eight points for the Warriors. Nahum Horton had three points, 10 rebounds and two steals.

Horton and Wester represented Cherokee County on the all-tournament team.

“I’m really proud of our guys. They fought hard,” Coach Wester said. “I’m proud of our seniors (Joel Wester, Horton and Morgan Ray). These last two years have been great and I hate to see it end for them. It was just two good teams battling it out, and they made a few more shots than we did.”