The South Panola Lady Tigers kept their season alive with a 62-57 win over Horn Lake Tuesday night.

Horn Lake is the site of the district tournament this year.

South Panola had a job defeating the Lady Eagles for the third time this season.

In the December 5 game, South Panola won 67-44. On January 23, South Panola barely won
49-48.

This win set up a third matchup with Olive Branch tonight at 7 p.m. in the championship game.

Regardless of the outcome, South Panola will play in the North State Championship Monday night.

If they defeat Olive Branch, they will play the loser of the Murrah/Provine game at home. If the Lady Tigers lose to Olive Branch, they will play the winner of that game on the road. The game will be at 7 p.m.

The Lady Tigers have not done well with the No. 10 ranked Olive Branch Lady Quistors (24-5) this season. They lost to Olive Branch 56-46 on December 14 and 51-33 on January 12.

Olive Branch defeated Southaven 67-40 Tuesday to make it to the championship game.

It was a tough match against Horn Lake Tuesday night. Only one point separated the teams going into the second quarter. South Panola led 15-14 and Horn Lake had the edge going into halftime, 29-28.

South Panola dominated in the third quarter outscoring the Lady Eagles 16-10 which really gave them the victory as both teams scored 18 points in the fourth quarter.

Sabrina Townsend was the leading scorer for the Lady Tigers with 22 points. Horn Lake’s Monica Williams was the leading scorer with 31 points.

Other Lady Tiger scorers include Skylar Barnes, 16 points; Tenisha Mitchell, 12 points; Vetorra Cole, 5 points; Kim Sanford, 4 points; and Stalisha Draper, 3 points.

Tigers
The Tigers still struggled against Horn Lake as they lost for the third time this season, 54-44. That ended the season for the Tigers.

Horn Lake led 27-22 at halftime. The Tigers saw a lot of success in the third quarter and tied the game at 36 going into halftime. The Tigers outscored Horn Lake 14-9 in the third quarter.

Horn Lake answered in the fourth quarter outscoring the Tigers 18-8 for the win and a chance to play Olive Branch in the championship game Friday night.

Olive Branch defeated Southaven 77-47 Tuesday night.

Rico Key was the high scorer for the Tigers with 13 points, followed by Antonio Allen with 10 points.
Other Tiger scorers include Kerrion Moore, 9 points; Nicholas Johnson and Michael Broadnax, 6 points each.

Olive Branch and Horn Lake will play following the girl’s game.

The crowd was a loud 7,368 strong. Ole Miss defeated No. 25 Alabama last Saturday 75-69, it’s first win over a top 25 team since the 2003-04 season.

LSU had won the last six meetings between these two teams, including a 62-55 win in January.

Leading scorer Clarence Sanders, 29 points, made the final basket to capture the win, hitting a 17-foot jumper with .6 seconds left in the game.
The win put the Rebels in sole possession of first place in the SEC West.

LSU was led in scoring by Glen "Big Baby" Davis, who scored 26 points.

Ole Miss will host George next Wednesday night at the Tad Smith Coliseum at 7 p.m. in another SEC showdown.

The annual event usually attracts two or three hundred volunteers, but Karr notes that a vast majority of them are from Yalobusha County and connected to the south side of Enid Lake.

Although the majority of shoreline on both sides is located in Yalobusha County, the north side is more accessible to Panola.

The Enid Lake Volunteers for Waste Management is an all volunteer organization whose mission is to clean up the shoreline of Enid Lake.

Karr blames the low turnout on the south side to the fact that Panola has two lakes, Sardis and Enid, pulling ecological minded volunteers in different directions.

The annual event at Enid begins at 7 a.m. when volunteers will first meet and divide into groups. The north side volunteers will meet at Chickasaw and break into smaller groups going to Lovejoy, Lakeside, Chickasaw and Bynum.

Karr will serve as the Lovejoy coordinator and promises that volunteers have a lot of fun.

Following three or so hours of picking up trash and debris, the group will convene with volunteers from the south side of the lake at Corps headquarters for a meal, t-shirts and door prizes.

In its third year, the annual clean-up has yielded 300 cubic yards of trash and and hundreds of tires.

Karr, who has spent a good part of his 44 years around Enid Lake, says that 50 years of trash has taken its toll on the lake. He explained that although some of the trash from the shorelines comes from people actually enjoying the lake for recreation, most of it comes from garbage being dumped in local creeks and streams.

Karr mentioned that there were 44 trucks in the lake bottom on a recent Sunday afternoon, and the litter left behind was obvious. Hundreds of local residents will soon be enjoying fishing during the crappie spawn and water skiers, boaters, campers will move toward the lake as temperatures rise.

Karr is wondering just how much debris can be removed if a small fraction of those lake users show up on February 17.

The district tournament gives teams like North Panola, who were seeded No. 5 of seven teams going into the tournament, a second chance.

The Cougars seized the opportunity and Tuesday night knocked off the No. 1 team in the district, Byhalia, 70-58 and earned the right to play for the district championship tonight.

Byhalia entered the tournament 7-0 in the district while North Panola was 2-5 in the district.

The students and school district are excited about this opportunity for the Cougar teams, according to head coach Eric Rice who said the team finally gelled to pull together back-to-back wins in the district tournament.

"It took time for us to come together and play as a team," Rice said.

Monday night, North Panola defeated Marks Palmer 49-48.

"It was close all the way through," Rice said. In the third quarter, North Panola was down by nine points. In the fourth, the Cougars found themselves down by nine points two times and came back.

The team got the lead down to four points with less than a minute to play.

Assistant coach Xavier Johnson drew up a plan for Rodregus Black to shoot a three-pointer, according to Rice.

"He (Black) made it and we were down by one," Rice said.

North Panola fouled Palmer and sent them to the free throw line to shoot a one-and-one. Palmer missed and Cougar Bruce Wilbourn pulled down the rebound.

"He took the ball the length of the court and made the layup to take the lead," Rice said.

The Cougars fouled Palmer who missed the free throw again. The Cougars pulled down the rebound again and held the ball until the clock ran out.

"It was a real hard fought game on both sides," Rice said. "Our guys played real hard. The comeback effort proved the true character and the type of players we have."

North Panola has lost close games throughout the season.

"We finally learned how to finish," Rice said.

Finishing with a win proved not to be a fluke as the Cougars took on the top-seeded Byhalia Indians Tuesday night.

North Panola led the majority of the game, according to Rice. At the half, North Panola had a 31-27 lead. Going into the fourth quarter, North Panola only had a one point lead, 43-42.

The Cougars turned up the heat in the fourth quarter, scoring 27 points, and putting the game out of Byhalia’s reach.

Rice said he felt Byhalia overlooked the Cougars and that gave the Cougars an unexpected advantage in the district tournament. Byhalia has defeated the Cougars twice this season.

"Our guys were ready to play," Rice said. "We played the way I thought we could play all along."
An area Rice was pleased with was the free throw shooting.

"We have a whole lot of talented players," Rice said. "They kept working and never gave up.

"We felt up for the challenge," he continued. "I told them it is hard to beat a team three times in a season. We are a different ball team now."

Tonight, Independence or Holly Springs will have to shoulder the same burden Byhalia and Palmer did ? trying to defeat the Cougar team a third time. Holly Springs and North Panola only met once this season on January and the Cougars lost 78-42.

The first time the teams met January 2, Independence won 57-40. It was a little harder February 5, but Independence still won 62-59.

Independence and Holly Springs played Thursday night in the late game and the score was not available at press time.

Against Palmer, Wilbourn was the leading scorer with 14 points. Other Cougars scoring were Ramone Robinson, 12 points; Templeton Hardy, 6 points; Rodregus Black and Dexter Robinson, 5 points each; Michael Johnson and Jarvis Taylor, 2 points each; Nick Black and Aldrick Russell, 1 point each.

Against Byhalia, Rodregus Black was the leading scorer with 23 points. Cornelius Blackmon of Byhalia scored 21 points for his team.

Other Cougar scorers include Ramone Robison, 16 points; Wilbourn, 11 points; Hardy, 8 points; Dexter Robinson, 7 points; Rico Young, 3 points; and Nick Black, 2 points.

Tipoff for tonight’s game is 8:30 p.m.

The Lady Cougars lost to Byhalia Monday night, 69-66, and ended their season.

The new baseball and softball fields are located across from the South Panola High School. The South Panola Tiger baseball team will throw out its first pitch at noon tomorrow. The fastpitch softball Lady Tigers will get started at 1 p.m.

The boys will host Grenada while the girls host Winona. Both are non-conference games.

Tiger baseball head coach Patrick Robey shelled out some information the public needs to know about to make this experience enjoyable for all fans.

"It’s very important that everybody parks in the high school parking lot," Robey said. "There are plans to put a cross walk. We will try to regulate traffic as best we can to make it safe for the kids, parents and fans."

Robey describes getting settled into the new fields as "growing pains."

"There may or may not be bleachers Saturday," he said. "We are trying to get some borrowed until we get our permanent ones in place. Bring a chair and you may want to wear old shoes."

The concrete for the parking area has not been poured as of Thursday evening and freshly turned ground makes for mud with the weather calling for a possibility of snow flurries Saturday morning.
"There are concrete sidewalks, but coming down the hill is dirt," Robey said. "We plan to pour steps this week but we’re competing with weather."

There will be a concession stand. A permanent one is scheduled to be built in the summer, according to Robey, but for this season a portable one will be brought in.

Softball head coach Ashleigh Hicks is excited about the new field and getting the season started.

"With the boys on their field and we on ours, it should be an exciting day," she said.

See today’s edition for the Baseball/Softball Preseason Special Section. Hear from the coaches about their teams and get introduced to the players.

Immanuel defeated North Delta 38-30 to end the Green Wave season.

Both teams struggled at the basket in the first quarter, but Immuanel had a 6-5 lead at the end.

Both teams had warmed up by the second quarter and were able to score, but Immanuel pulled away with a 21-14 halftime lead.

It was a struggle again in the third quarter, especially for the Green Waves as Immanuel outscored them 8-4 for a 29-18 lead going into the fourth quarter.

North Delta was able to outscore Immanuel in the fourth quarter 12-9, but the comeback was too late.

Dakota Mabry was the leading scorer for the Green Waves with 12 points, followed by Brandon White with seven points.

Other scorers include John Terry Moore, 5 points; Evan West, Austin Boling and Taylor Herron, with 2 points each.

The Green Waves ended the season 13-15.