Decatur High boys basketball coach Jamie Lee saw the Red Raiders’ 64-48 home victory over Athens on Monday night as more than just another win.

In addition, he saw his team beginning to peak at the right time as it clinched its third straight win. Decatur also has victories in that stretch over Florence and Sparkman.

“I’m really pleased with the effort we gave,” Lee said. “It was a team win. We had four players to score double figures. That in itself makes it a team win.

“A game like this gives us momentum and confidence. We’re one week away from the area tournament and we’re playing about as good as we can. That’s exactly what we want to be doing.”

The Red Raiders utilized a balanced attack with four players scoring double figures.

William Johnson led Decatur (12-13) with 17 points, five rebounds and three assists. Chris Coffey finished with 12 points, six rebounds and four assists, while Torrick Spangler had 11 points and seven rebounds. Raheem England pitched in 10 points and five rebounds.

“All season long, we would try to win two games in a row, and that just didn’t happen a lot,” Coffey said. “We would win one and lose one, win one and lose one. Now we’ve got three in a row, but that just boils down to what Coach (Jamie Lee) has been telling us all season.

“He has been telling us that we have to be at our best at the end of the season.”

Trey Brooks led Athens (13-12) with 25 points and four rebounds, and Chris Cain added 10 points.

“Our shooting, our rebounding and giving them a lot of second shots cost us,” Athens coach Venard Hendrix said. “When you miss that many shots like we did, that means there’s going to be a lot of rebounds, and we didn’t fair well there either.”

Athens girls 49, Decatur 46: Decatur came close but couldn’t pull out the victory.

With 10 seconds left to play, Britney McCloud made a layup, cutting Athens’ lead to 47-46. The Lady Raiders quickly fouled Elizabeth Schexnayder after the in-bounds pass, but she calmly made a pair of free throws, and the Athens defense closed out the win from there.

Lecresha Horton led Athens (20-6) with 19 points and four rebounds, while Ashley Jackson had 13 points and eight rebounds.

“We just did the things we had to do to win the game,” Jackson said. “We were focused when we had to be. We’ve been working real hard on our defense in practice and I think it showed out there.

“We have to keep playing like this the rest of the way. This wasn’t a region game and a region win, but it was a really big win and a really important win for us. We’re trying to get to Wallace State (for regionals), so everything we do is very important.”

Britney McCloud had a double-double performance for Decatur (15-1`4) with 23 points and 10 rebounds. Kendra McCloud added 10 points, six rebounds and four steals.

Decatur coach Brad Boy said his team had a poor offensive showing. The Raiders made 15 of 60 shots from the floor.

“We simply have to shoot the ball better,” Boy said. “We only made 20 percent of our shots in the first half. You can’t do that against a team, especially a ranked team and expect to win shooting like that.”