Local teams match up with Starkville in MCC event

Rocky Higginbotham / sports editor
The Meridian Star

The boys’ and girls’ teams from Starkville High School are the only non-area teams participating in the Meridian Community College Classic Saturday.

And when they arrive at MCC’s Graham Gymnasium, they’ll be involved in the two marquee matchups of the day.

Both of Starkville’s squads are ranked, and they’ll be involved in a pair of top-10 showdowns against the Southeast Lauderdale girls and Meridian High boys in the final two of six games on tap for MCC Saturday.

“We’re really proud of those two games,” MCC women’s basketball coach and athletic director Hilary Allen said. “Both teams in both of those games are ranked in the top 10, and it was almost a top-five showdown.”

Starkville’s boys, who are 9-1 on the year, moved up one spot to No. 2 in this week’s Jackson Clarion-Ledger Super 10 poll. Meridian’s boys, meanwhile, are 9-2 and ranked No. 3 after being No. 1 a week ago.

The Starkville girls are No. 9, but were No. 6 a week ago before a surprising loss to Noxubee County — a team the Lady Yellowjackets had already beaten by 21 points earlier this season — on Saturday night in Macon. The Lady Jackets are 9-1, while fifth-ranked and defending Class 3A state champion Southeast is 13-0.

“If Starkville hadn’t lost Saturday, it would have at least been No. 5 vs. No. 6,” Allen said.

Saturday’s MCC Classic gets under way at noon with a matchup between the Calvary Christian School boys and Grace Christian out of Louisville.

At 1:30 and 3 p.m., Northeast Lauderdale and Bay Springs will lock horns in a doubleheader rematch of their contests from earlier this season — both won by Northeast.

The Southeast boys then take the floor at 4:30 p.m. against Class 5A Wayne County before the Southeast and Starkville girls tangle at 6:15. Meridian’s boys meet Starkville in the finale at 8 p.m.

Meridian CC and Eaves among NJCAA’s golfing elite

Sports Information Reports
MERIDIAN, Miss.

For the sixth consecutive time since 2001, the Meridian Community College golf team has finished the fall season ranked in the NJCAA’s top ten division II men’s golf poll. Following a successful fall schedule which included three tournament trips out-of-state, two tournament victories and a two individual medalist titles- the MCC Eagle golf team has achieved it’s highest NJCAA fall ranking by being #4 in the nation.

MCC’s previous high ranking was #6 in both the 2003 and 2005 NJCAA fall poll. This year is the first time MCC has cracked the nations top five in the fall poll.

“It is a testament to the hard work that our guys have put in this season, it also shows the great tradition that Coach Hart built here at Meridian,” said first year head coach Sean Covich.

“But rankings don’t mean anything come tournament time- We are honored to be among the nations elite, but we’ve got to continue to work hard so that we can keep that ranking and we’ve got an entire spring schedule ahead of us.”

Two time defending national champion Darton College out of Georgia is #1 followed by John A Logan College out of Illinois who sits at #2. Six time national champion Tyler Junior College out of Texas is #3, with the MCC Eagles #4. Oakland Community College in Michigan rounds out the nations top five.

The NJCAA also released their top 15 individual golfers among division II schools. Meridian’s own Justin Eaves was among those top 15.

Eaves, who recently signed a national letter of intent to play golf for Troy University, had an adjusted tournament scoring average of 72.9 and sits at #15 in the NJCAA individual poll. Eaves was a 2006 NJCAA All American and led MCC to a 3rd place finish in the national championship last season. He has 5 rounds of even-par or better in the fall season to earn him a spot among the nation’s elite. Eaves is the sophomore captain for the golf team and is a member of the MCC golf All Academic team.

To view the poll, please visit www.njcaa.org and click on “Men’s Sports (Golf II).”

MCC women topple Coahoma

By Sean Covich
Special to The Star

MCC’s Lady Eagles used their last home ballgame of the 2006 calendar year to earn their eighth victory of the season. MCC defeated Coahoma Community College 86-70. It was MCC’s second victory over the Lady Tigers this season. MCC defeated Coahoma 93-85 in overtime on Nov. 18 in Clarksdale, MS.

The Lady Eagles were led by four players who had double digits in both points and rebounds.

Aneshia McBride was the leading scorer with 22 points. The sophomore forward from Provine High School also claimed 13 rebounds. Jennifer Wair scored 17 points, but led all players with 21 rebounds.

“My assistant coach (Celia Allen) challenged Jennifer at halftime to go out and get 10 rebounds in the second half,” said Lady eagles head coach Hilary Allen. “Not only did she get that, she came away with 14 in one half to total 21. That was an outstanding effort on the glass.”

Nadosha Strickland scored 18 points for MCC and Carla Latham rounded out the double figure scoring with 15 points.

Other Lady Eagles who pitched in included Hilal Yildirim with 8 points, Zirconia Hopkins with 4 points and Holly Dial with 2 points.

Omeshia Frost and Cheetara Johnson scored 12 points for Coahoma.

The Lady Eagles will be of until Jan. 5 when they travel to Georgia Perimeter College. MCC Lady Eagles improved to 8-3 on the season. Their next home game will be against East Central Community College Jan. 11.

Coahoma 66
MCC men 60

Taking advantage of Dexter LeFlore’s 11 first half points, the Meridian Community College Eagle’s held a five point, 30-25 halftime lead over the visiting Coahoma Community College Tigers.

The Tigers defense came out in the second half and shut down the Eagles, as LeFlore was held scoreless in the final half and the Tigers claimed a 66-60 victory over the MCC Eagles.

Coahoma's Antywan Jones led all scorers with 17 points.

LeFlore was the leading scorer for the Eagles with 11, Keith James had 10 points, Kolby Tillman had 9 points, and Regis Huddleston had 8 points for MCC. Maurice Naylor and Santez Johnson had 7 points for the Eagles. Chris Leggett had 3 points.

The MCC men’s squad will play two more ballgames before the Christmas break. Both of those games are on the road, out of state. MCC travels to Selma on Dec. 15 before playing Shelton on Dec. 19. MCC fell to 3-5 on the season.

MCC Women Knock Off Delgado

The Meridian Star

The Meridian Community College women ran thier record to 6-3 on the season with a 73-52 win at Delgado (LA) Community College Wednesday night.

Meridian will host Coahoma Community College Saturday at 4 p.m. at MCC's Graham Gymnasium.

In Wednesday's victory, MCC roared to a 43-23 lead at halftime and got 14 pts. from freshman Jennifer Wair.

Zirconia Hopkins, another freshman forward, tailied nine points and evry player for MCC score.

WMER 1390 AM radio to broadcast MCC Basketball Games

12/07/06

MERIDIAN, Miss. - Continuing to bring the best live junior college sporting events to Meridian, MCC, has teamed up with local Christian/southern gospel radio station 1390 AM WMER to broadcast the school’s upcoming double-header basketball games with Coahoma Community College.

The broadcast begins this Saturday (Dec. 9) with the Lady Eagles game v. Coahoma at 4 pm and will continue onto the conclusion of the men’s game between MCC and Coahoma.

MCC’s sports information director and head golf coach, Sean Covich will call the play-by-play action. Former MCC male athlete of the year and North East Lauderdale High School basketball standout, Clinton Hales, will provide the color commentary.

This Saturday's MCC men’s game is the final home game for the Eagles during the fall semester. Coach George Brooks and his squad will travel to Wallace-Selma on December 15 and then wrap up the fall portion of their schedule with a trip to Shelton State on December 19.

This Saturday’s game for the Lady Eagles will mark their final fall semester game as they will be off until a trip to face Georgia Perimeter on January 5.

Also, any fan that brings a new, unwrapped toy to the game will receive free admission into the basketball double-header- as part of the MCC golf and tennis team’s partnership with the US Marie Corps Toys For Tots campaign.

Shelton St. downs MCC

from staff reports
The Meridian Star

The Meridian Community College men’s basketball team battled toe-to-toe with highly-touted Shelton State Tuesday night before falling 71-64 in area junior-college basketball action at MCC’s Graham Gymnasium.Shelton, which began the season ranked No. 13 in the nation, improved to 7-2 while MCC fell to 3-4.

MCC trailed just 35-33 at halftime, but head coach George Brooks took no comfort in a close loss to the highly-touted visitors.

“We lost. There’s no such thing as a good loss,” Brooks said. “We did some things better than we did last week and the guys played hard.”

Freshman forward Santez Johnson pumped in a game-high and career-high 22 points for MCC, while Dexter Leflore scored 16 points; ex-Meridian High standout Chris Leggett scored nine; and freshman Regis Huddleston of Bay Springs had eight.

“I thought we played well,” Johnson said. “We’ve got a young team and we’re improving.”

Leon McKinney scored 17 points, Lakendrix Madison hit five 3-pointers and finished with 16 points and Rayshon Coleman scored 12 for Shelton State.

MCC’s women go to Delgado, La. tonight, then the Lady Eagles and Eagles host Coahoma Saturday at 4 and 6 p.m.

— Rocky Higginbotham

Lady Eagles lose on the road

Wallace-Selma 73
MCC women 55

SELMA, Ala. - Wallace-Selma pulled away from Meridian Community College's Lady Eagles in the second half to claim the victory.

MCC trailed 29-26 at the half and fell to 5-3 on the season.

Anesia McBride led MCC with 18 points while NaDosha Strickland scored 16.

- Steve Swogetinsky

Georgia Perimeter proves too much for Lady Eagles

Ryan Satcher
special to the Star
The Meridian Star

The Meridian Community College Lady Eagles gave visiting Georgia Perimeter all it could handle on Saturday afternoon but the No. 23-ranked Lady Jaguars’ athleticism finally took over in a 93-86 victory.

“Georgia Perimeter has a great program,” said MCC coach Hilary Allen. “They have quality athletes that can run and shoot. They are just a good team. We played with them and played the whole 40 minutes. We just kept fighting and I’m really proud of them for that.”

The Lady Eagles jumped out to a lead early in the game with strong outside shooting.

Nadasha Strickland and Carla Latham each hit a three-pointer in the opening minutes to give Meridian an 8-4 edge.

Georgia Perimeter came back with six points from Phebe Smith to take the lead.Meridian was able to tie the game several times during the first half but was unable to take back the lead in the first half.

The Lady Jaguars stretched the lead out to five points on two different occasions but MCC battled back each time to tie the game.

Georgia Perimeter finally stretched out a lead with a 7-0 run with just over five minutes left in the first half.

Renee Jackson scored five points in the run to help the Lady Jaguars take a 35-28 lead with 5:04 left in the first.

Meridian again answered as Latham scored five points in a 7-2 run to cut the lead down to 37-35 with 1:42 left in the half.

The Lady Jaguars took a 40-37 lead into the locker room at half but the Lady Eagles came out strong in the second half to take their first lead since early in the contest.

Latham had a pair of three-pointers as Meridian ran off the first 12 points of the second half to take a 49-40 lead with 17:27 left in the game.

MCC stretched the lead out to as many as 10 points on a three-point play by Anesia McBride with 16:03 left to play.

The Lady Jaguars slowly cut into the lead and made the score 55-51 on a three-pointer by Ashley Hagans with 13:59 left to play.

Meridian held a three-point lead with just over 11 minutes left when Georgia Perimeter finally started taking back control of the game.

The Lady Jaguars went on a 12-1 run led by four points from Leslie Phillips to take a 69-61 lead with 7:58 remaining.Meridian answered with four points from Holly Dial and trailed by just three points with 6:25 left in the game but the Lady Jaguars again went on a run to stretch out a lead.

Georgia Perimeter went on a 10-0 run to take an 81-68 lead with 4:24 remaining in the game.

Meridian continued to fight and cut the lead down to seven points on a bucket by Dial with 2:10 remaining.

MCC got to within six points in the final minute but Georgia Perimeter held on for the 93-86 victory.Britteny Henderson scored 26 points to lead the Lady Jaguars in the victory while Smith had 17 and Jackson had 13. Hagans added 12 in the win.Latham, Dial and Strickland each had 17 points for MCC in the loss.

The Lady Eagles, now 5-2 for the season, will travel to take on Selma on Monday night in a makeup game.