| EMCC sweeps Coahoma in convincing fashion in North Division hoops action |
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SCOOBA – The East Mississippi basketball teams swept visiting Coahoma in convincing fashion Monday night, with the Lady Lions prevailing 85-50 and the Lions completing the MACJC North Division sweep with an 89-63 win in the nightcap at EMCC’s Keyes T. Currie Coliseum.
In Monday’s opener, head coach Sharon Thompson’s Lady Lions never trailed Coahoma in raising their overall record to 6-5 and evening their division mark to 1-1 on the year. The EMCC women used a 20-6 run midway through the opening half to take a 38-16 lead late in the half. A commanding 45-24 halftime advantage quickly turned into an insurmountable 31-point cushion (55-24), as the Lady Lions opened the second stanza scoring 10 unanswered points before Coahoma’s first second-half points came at the 15:55 mark. The visiting Lady Tigers could only manage to get as close as 23 points (62-39) midway through the second half, before EMCC responded with seven straight points en route to coasting to the easy 35-point triumph. All 13 Lady Lions who entered the contest made it into the scoring column. Freshman guard Natalie Tate of Columbus and freshman forward Shelby Crawford of Thomasville, Ala., led the Lady Lions with 14 points apiece. Reigning all-state forward Martika Hull, of Meridian’s Southeast Lauderdale High School, followed with 13 points for the winners. Coahoma’s Eureka Nunnally topped all scorers with 18 points. In the nightcap, head coach Mark White’s Lions improved to 11-2 overall and 2-0 in division play with the 26-point home victory. As with the preceding women’s contest, the EMCC men never trailed in the game. With the opening 20 minutes staying to within a single-digit margin, the home team held a slim 37-32 halftime lead. The EMCC advantage stayed at single digits for the first three minutes of the second stanza until preseason NJCAA All-American CoCo Ware connected on consecutive baskets to bump the margin up to a dozen points (49-37) by the 16:44 mark. From there, the home-standing Lions steadily added to the lead before settling for the impressive 89-63 triumph. Ware, a reigning NJCAA All-Region 23 standout guard from Starkville, paced a quartet of double-figure EMCC scorers with a game-high 19 points. The former Starkville High School product has averaged 28 points an outing over his last three games, including a career-high 38 points in Saturday’s home win over Marion Military Institute. Freshman forward Jonathan King recorded his second double-double in the last three games with 18 points and 12 rebounds. Freshman forward Marino Thompson, a product of Southeast Lauderdale, followed with 14 points, while sophomore guard Terence Bennett of Jackson rounded out EMCC’s double-digit scorers with 10 points. The visiting Tigers were led by Kelvin Miller’s 16 points. The EMCC women play at Shelton State Saturday afternoon (Dec. 12), while the Lions don’t play again until a Jan. 6 men’s/women’s doubleheader at Meridian Community College. Both East Mississippi basketball teams resume North Division action on Monday, Jan. 11 by playing host to Itawamba in a hoops twinbill at Currie Coliseum on the Scooba campus. |
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| Last Updated ( Tuesday, 08 December 2009 ) |
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