MOULTRIE – Amareyia Knighton became just the 10th Colquitt County girls basketball player to score more than 1,000 career points in the Lady Packers 66-27 win over Leon High on Tuesday.
Needing just 25 points to reach the plateau heading into the season, she scored 13 in the season-opening victory over Thomas County Central on Monday and shot past the 1,000-point mark with 20 in the Tuesday victory.
“It was so great to see her join that elite club,” Lady Packers coach Stephanie Cody said.
Both games were played at Lowndes High in the Charles Cooper Invitational.
The senior shooting guard now has 1,008 points as she and her Lady Packers teammates prepare for their home-opener on Friday, Dec. 6, against Cairo.
Knighton is just three points behind Brelinda Copeland Sullen on the list of 10 Lady Packers who have scored 1,000 or more career points.
She is just 22 points behind the 1,030 points scored by Sarah Edwards from 1975-1979.
The leading scorer in Lady Packer history is Makeba Ponder, who scored 2,071 points from 2010-2014.
Knighton was joined by Amira Walter-Smith in scoring 20 points in the win over Leon.
Sophomore Nicardia Robinson added 11.
Colquitt also got nine points from Caylnn Singletary and six from Azaria Battle.
While Cody expects Walter-Smith and Knighton to score in double-digits, Cody said she likes to see the scoring spread around.
“One of my goals was to have disbursed scoring,” she said.
Monday’s 42-28 win over Thomas County Central and Tuesday’s one-sided victory over Leon did not come against the kind of opponents the Lady Packers will need to beat to equal the 22 wins the 2023-2024 team had.
“All these games are learning opportunities to help us get ready by region time,” she said.
The wins over the Lady Jackets and the Lady Lions also are the first of Cody’s head coaching career.
A 14-year assistant under Rondesha Williams, she followed her mentor as the head of the Colquitt County girls program this year.
Asked if she had jitters before her first two games, she laughed and said, “I had jitters when I was an assistant. I wasn’t any different.”