Season comes to an end for Lady Hornets
Published 7:00 am Wednesday, February 26, 2014
MAGNOLIA — The season came to an end for the Poplarville girls Monday night.
The Lady Hornets dropped a 59-29 decision to homestanding South Pike to open the Class 4A South State playoffs.
The Lady Eagles move to 23-7 on the year, and will advance to the Class 4A South State Tournament beginning Thursday.
Poplarville ends the season under first year head coach Dee Robinson Cable at 7-17.
The home team jumped out to a quick 10-0 lead, and led 16-2 after the first quarter. The Lady Eagles extended that lead to 29-6 at halftime, and cruised to the easy win.
Amber Haper tallied a game high 16 points for South Pike, while Monica Frazier added 14 points to the winning cause.
Zanaisha Turner paced Poplarville with seven points, while Shaneisha Hudderson added six points.
South Pike will play Forrest County AHS in the opening round of the Class 4A South State Tournament Thursday.
Despite an early first round exit in the playoffs for the second consecutive season, the playoff appearance by the Lady Hornets marked the 13th straight year that the Poplarville girls had reached the playoffs, which is currently the longest streak by any team in Pearl River County.
• In other local basketball action Monday, the Pearl River Community College men fell in the opening round of the MACJC state tournament to East Mississippi 73-68.
Seeded second from the MACJC’s North Division, head coach Mark White’s 18-5 EMCC Lions now advance to meet South No. 1 seed Jones County Junior College in Wednesday’s 3 p.m. semifinal-round contest. JCJC prevailed, 84-57, over North No. 4 seed Coahoma in other first-round men’s action. PRCC was the South’s third seed.
Tennessee-Chattanooga signee Jacolby Mobley led all scorers with 25 points for his sixth 20-point effort of the season. Davon Ester, who registered his third double-double of the year by also collecting a team-high 10 rebounds, and Foster followed with 13 and 12 points, respectively, for the winners.
Pearl River was paced by Quintarius Porter’s 17 points, while DeAngelo Coleman and Jeremy Hollimon added 12 and 11 points, respectively.
Jones (20-4) took care of Coahoma behind Johnny Zuppardo’s 24 points. Mark Haywood led the Tigers (9-15) with 17 points.
Also, Gulf Coast beat Northwest 108-97 as Tony Bridges scored 31 and Roger Woods added 25 to lead the Bulldogs (19-5). Rashon Coleman led the Rangers (12-10)with 16 while Dajo Reno added 14 in the loss.
Gulf Coast faces host ICC in the other men’s semifinal game today. ICC opened the MACJC Tournament in impressive fashion Monday, defeating Southwest 103-91 at the Davis Event Center.
Six Indians scored in double figures with Alex Anderson leading the way with 26, Tyrone Wooten adding 19, Johnthan McGee 15, Lakee Westbrook 14, Tory Rice 12 and Austin Timms chipping in 10 points.
Rice recorded his ninth double-double of the season, collecting a game-high 12 rebounds for the Indians.
Twymond Howard scored 28 for Southwest.
The PRCC women met the host Itawamba Community College in the women’s opening round of play late Tuesday night.