By By Marty Stamper/The Meridian Star
Nov. 16, 2001
DECATUR – East Central Community College swept East Mississippi Community College in junior college basketball Thursday night.
The Lady Warriors won 62-45 in the opener with the Warriors claiming a 71-64 victory in the second game.
ECCC returns to action Monday against Holmes in the annual ECCC Tournament. Jones will take on Itawamba in Monday's other games which begin at 2 p.m. ECCC will play the 6 and 8 p.m. contests.
ECCC 71
EMCC 64
The Warriors got their first win of the season with the seven-point victory.
ECCC led 32-30 at halftime behind 11 points from Winfred Craig and 10 from Maurice English.
The Lions were led by Ryan Rodriguez with 10 points in the first half.
Three baskets by James Denson gave the Warriors a 38-34 lead with 17:30 to go.
EMCC fought back to take a 46-44 lead with 13:26 remaining on a steal and layup by Dennis Dupree after a pair of 3-pointers from ReShard Alonza.
The Warriors reclaimed the lead with a 7-0 run over the next three minutes and would never trail again. A 3-pointer from English highlighted the run.
The Lions crept back to within 58-56 on a free throw from Charles Braxton with 2:49 left, but didn't score again until just 49 seconds remained when Raphael Edwards made the second of two free throws. By then, the Warriors had built a 65-57 lead.
ECCC, 1-3, got 16 points from Denson, 15 from English, 12 from Craig, nine from Corey Hornsby, and eight from Markeith Brown.
EMCC, 1-3, got 21 points from Starkville's Edwards, 10 each from Dupree and Rodriguez, and eight from Tramechie Evans.
Both teams shot 50 percent at the charity stripe with ECCC going 19-of-38 and EMCC making 8-of-16 attempts.
ECCC 62
EMCC 45
The Lady Warriors improved to 3-1 with the 17-point win over EMCC, 0-4.
A 3-pointer from Tamekia Foley with 10:30 left in the first half put ECCC up 11-9 and the Lady Warriors never trailed after that.
A 5-0 run by 6-foot-3 freshman center Belinda Potter of Monroe, La., over a 49-second span in the final two minutes of the first half extended ECCC's advantage to 33-19 which the Lady Warriors took into halftime.
Potter had 11 first half points with Nikki LaCour adding eight and Foley tossing in seven.
EMCC got to within 37-22 on a three-point play by Margaret McClure with 16:11 left, but the Lady Lions didn't get their next basket of the second half until 12:30 remained when Erica Ray connected on a 3-pointer to trim ECCC's lead to 41-27. The Lady Lions got no closer than 15 points the rest of the night.
Potter led ECCC with 17 points. LaCour scored 12 with Foley adding 10. Ten Lady Warriors scored with a 6-of-18 showing at the free-throw line being the only big negative.