2002

WEEK OF '-/ i"cb lS2? ------------------------

THE MERIDIAN STAR Friday, February 8, 2002 BASKETBALL ECCC look s toward postseason By Marty Stamper staff writer

win. "Any win i" big right no\\ becau"c it moves us back into a fightin~ chance for a possible second or third place and even first, depending on what happens on the way in." ECCC coach Brad Hodgt' said. "If we can pull out the next four, there's no telling where we could be at." All of the South Division women's teams have at least two league losses. ..But it was a big win. It's tht• first time we've beaten them here since I've been here," Hodge said. "They've only lost two games in the regular season in two years. "We had some leadership step up and we just played good, sound, fundamental basketball in the second half offensively. In the firs~ half, we were atrocious offensively. Defenstvely, I thought we did a good job. '"We did a good job of putting that Meridian loss (Monday night) behind us. It's been a tough week for us. I'm very proud of the effort they gavc. They really stuck to the game plan." :ECCC travels to Southwest Mississippi onMonday. laCour led ECCC with 26 points. Ford scored 16. including back-to-hack baskets to keep ECCC up 59-54 with just over six minutes showing. Cumberland had 14, Giddings six, and Brown five. Cumberland hit three 3s with LaCour hitting two. Burns hit four 3s iilleading Co-I.in with 20 points. Lindsay Altman had 12, Chrio.,ty Brown 10, Shaquita Smith nine, and Nikki ntakely eight. The lady Warrior::; held Mindy Livau– d~s. who got in foul trouble, to just five pomts. '"lYe went in with a game plan of who to guard and who not to guard and fortu– nately. it worked out," Hodge said.'

ECCC men Co-lin

77 64

DECATUR- Feb. 7 was pretty much a make-or-break day for the postseason hopes of the East Central Community Col– lege basketball teams. Both the Warriors and Lady Warrior took huge strides forward as they knocked off Copiah-Lincoln in Thur~day's MACJC South Divi ·ion contests in the Brackeen– Wood Physical Education Building. . The Lady Warriors handed Co-Lin just 1t second regular- ea on loss in the last two years. beating the 1-4th-ranked Lady Wolve 72-66 in the opener. The Warriors completed the sweep with a 77-64 victory over the Wolve-.. The Lady Warriors outscored Co-Lin 49-36 in the second half to up their league record to 5-3 and their overall mark to 11-7. ECCC trailed 30-23 at halftime after Lady Warrior sophomore Lori Cumberland connected on a 3-pointer from the left corner as time ran out in the first half. Back-to-back three's from Nikki LaCour and Cumberland pulled the Lady Warriors to within 34-33 with 17:33 left and a free throw by Shelly Giddings knotted the con– te tat 34-34 at the 16:58 mark. Co-Lin took five three-point leads before an 8-0 ECCC run gave the Lady Warriors a 55-50 edge with 7:31 remaining. LaCour had three of the four baskets with the last coming when she swatted a Co-Lin pass into the backcourt, ran the ball down and laid it up for the 55-50 advantage. ' The lady \\'olve got a<; close as two poinb \\hen a 3-pointer from Tiania Burns made it 61-59 with 3:3 to go. ECCC rr:::.ponded with baskets by &:hley B~own and Chri.:.tina Ford to go up by ,]x (65-~9) v.ith 1:351eft. Cumberla:td, Gidding', and LaCour ~vuu .... •• ed to make en-oi-their~!..;ht 1n:e thro the:rln.al75 ond ... to ... eaJ lhe

T.he Warriors started their game hot, leadmg by as many as 16 points in the first 20 minutes before taking a 41-321ead into halftime. "We can1e out and played a little more aggressive to start the 'game," ECCC coach Bill Smith said. "We were hitting shots early and I think that might have surpri-;ed them." Co-Lin scrapped back to within 54-53 on a basket by Jason Scott with just under 12 minutes left. The Warriors responded with a 12-0 run to break the game open During the run ECCC got two 3-pointe~s from Winfred Craig and another fr'Om Corey Horn ·bv to tak; a 67-~3lead with 6:37 remaining.· We SWitched to the zone with about 10 minutes to go in the game and that kind of threw them off," Smith said. '1bev mi ... -.ed quite a few shots." · Hornsby led the Warriors \\ith 24 point... as they improved to 8-10 overall and 3-5 in division play. ECCC, Co-Lin, and Hind ... each have at least five league los::.es with at least one of the three tean1 · making the state playoffs. The Warrior~ ~till have Hinds at home and last place Pearl Rher on the road. Their other two gam are at Southwest and with Jones a ECCC. "That was a big win," Sn_· said ~\e just got to take them one a• a time. Hope– fully, that will get us into conten · n f r the playoffs." ECCC also got 19 point, from Cnug, 11 from Maurice Engli-.h, nine fr J Denson. and seven from Donzel CrettS,h31;.·. Co-Lin got 15 point... fr Bruce ... ·th. 14 from Scott, and eicllt each fr tin Christian and B J. Black. The W h-e dropped to &-12m~ aad - sion.

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