By Myra Bean
The North Panola Cougars played Holly Springs as hard as they could for the district championship Saturday afternoon, but the Hawks pulled out a 57-47 win.

The Cougars (11-13)still earned a berth in the north state championship where they will host Ruleville Central (6-21) tonight at 7 p.m. in the first round. The winner will face the winner of the Mooreville (16-11)/South Pontotoc (8-23) game on Friday at 7 p.m.

The Cougars and the Hawks earned first round byes and defeated their respective foes on Thursday night. The Cougars downed Charleston 64-47 while Holly Springs took care of M. S. Palmer.

North Panola 64, Charleston 47

Demetrick Porter, an All-Tournament selection, connected on five three-pointers to lead the Cougars with 19 points.

North Panola led 12-10 going into the second quarter which was a different offensive story. The Cougars outscored the Tigers 14-7 to lead 26-17 at halftime. The Cougars cruised through the second half outscoring Charleston 38-30 for the final score.

Also scoring for the Cougars were All-Tournament selection Bremarkwon Bobo, 16 points; Vennis Mills, 10 points; Jordan Dandridge, eight points; Robert Oliver, seven points; and rounding out the scoring with two points each were Kier Washington and Jermarcus Jones.
Holly Springs 57, North Panola 47

Against Holly Springs, the officials had a tight squeeze on the game, as both teams were over the limit in fouls in the first half. North Panola also had 13 fouls in the second half and Holly Springs had eight.

They were watching everything very close as the Cougars were tagged with seven traveling calls in the first half.

Senior Robert Oliver spent most of the first half on the bench as he was hit with two quick fouls in the first quarter. The Cougars missed his aggressiveness and experience in the low post but were able to take a slight lead, 33-30, into halftime.

In the second quarter, the Cougars led by as many as 12 points as they were able to force the Hawks to make bad shots and turnovers. The Hawks called a timeout to revamp and change the game plan and started to eat into the lead to cut it to three.

Defense was a factor in the third quarter as Holly Springs outscored the Cougars 14-8. Holly Springs was able to retake the lead, 36-35, with 5:07 left in the quarter. The lead changed hands a couple of times until the end of the quarter when Holly Springs led 44-41.

The Cougars retook the lead 45-44 with 5:23 left in the game, just a few seconds later Holly Springs scored and went ahead 46-45 and that was as close as the Cougars would be the rest of the afternoon.

Dandridge led the Cougars in scoring with 18 points and nine rebounds. Other scorers include Robert Oliver and Bobo, eight points each; Mills, six points; Washington, four points; Porter, two points; and Marvin Oliver, one point.