By By Marty Stamper/The Meridian Star
March 21, 2001
SALINA, Kan. While most of the Mississippi girls participating in the NJCAA Women's National Basketball Tournament obviously play for the Lady Warriors of East Central Community College, two other teams have Mississippians on their roster.
The most prominent of which is former Cleveland East Side standout Amie Williams (18.0 ppg, 12.4 rpg). The 6-foot-8 giant plays for Southwest Tennessee Community College (formerly Shelby State) as does Larisha Graves (14.9 ppg, 8.2 rpg) who played for Yazoo County's 39-0 Class 3A state champion team last year.
Latoya Robinson, a 6-foot-3 sophomore from Brandon, plays for John A. Logan College of Carterville, Ill.
Previous success stories: Mississippi hasn't had a national champion since Northeast in 1987. Northwest won in 1983.
The tournament's all-time leading scorer is Kim Wingard of Holmes. She tossed in 45 points in a game and had a record 118 total points during the 1992 tournament.
The biggest: Of the 16 teams here, the school with the largest enrollment is Utah Valley State College. UVSC has 22,000 students at its Orem, Utah, campus.
Tallahassee (Fla.) Community College is second with 12,500.
East Central ranks 11th of the 16 with an enrollment of 2,370.
The fewest: The school with the smallest enrollment making it to the national tournament is Louisburg (N.C.) with only 550 students.
Nice efforts: Chinyere James had 17 points and teammate Aiysha Smith had 15 points and 11 points to lead defending national champion Tyler (Texas) Junior College to a 62-58 win over Western Nebraska.
Syreeta Bromfield scored 15 points, Tai Wilson had 14, and Jennifer Knox added 13 to lead Tallahassee (Fla.) Community College to a 72-52 win over Louisburg (N.C.) College. Tawander Whittington had 18 points, while teammate Brandy Fowler had 14 points and 11 rebounds for Louisburg.
Six-foot-1 sophomore Leah Donaldson scored 20 points off the bench, while 6-foot sophomore Khisha Asubuhi had 14 points and 13 rebounds in Cincinnati (Ohio) State's 58-55 upset of second-seeded Central Arizona. Ida Dotson had 21 points and 11 rebounds for the Arizona team.
Amisha Carter tossed in 25 points and had 12 rebounds to lead top-seeded Midland (Texas) College to a 72-66 win over Wallace-Hanceville. Paula Dill had 19 points for the Alabama squad.
How'd they do?: Meridian Community College's Lady Eagles were quickly eliminated from the Region 23 Tournament with a 75-74 quarterfinal loss to Pearl River.
In going 26-5, the Lady Eagles did take on two of the 16 teams that reached the national tournament, going 3-1 against that competition.
MCC was 2-0 against Region 22 champion Wallace State-Hanceville, winning 85-59 at Meridian and 97-91 in overtime on the road.
The Lady Eagles were 1-1 with Region 7 winner Southwest Tennessee, winning 92-81 in Meridian and losing 101-90 in Memphis.
Region 6 champion Cloud County (Kan.) split two regular season meetings with Region 11 champion Iowa Western early in the season with each team winning at home.
NJCAA Hall of Fame honors Mississippian: At Monday's NJCAA Women's National Basketball Championship Banquet and Hall of Fame induction, former Gulf Coast Community College coach/administrator Sue Ross was one of three inductees.
Also inducted were Barbara Gill of Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, Kan., and former South Plains (Texas) College standout Sheryl Swoopes.
Swoopes, who now plays for the three-time WNBA champion Houston Comets, did not attend.
Marty Stamper is a sports writer for The Meridian Star. E-mail him at mstamper@themeridianstar.com.