A wireless communications system may include wireless communications devices configured to communicate with one another on a given channel via a time division based communications protocol. A communication initiation wireless communications device configured to transmit data in an initiator time slot of the given channel. A repeater wireless communications device configured to receive the transmitted data from the communications initiation wireless communications device in the initiator time slot and retransmit the data in a repeater time slot of the given channel. A receiver wireless communications device configured to determine a respective quality metric for data from each of the initiator time slot and the repeater time slot, and use data from the initiator time slot or the repeater time slot based upon the respective quality metrics thereof.