It was another big week for Louisville High School graduate Corey McCullough. Not only did the senior kicker at Alcorn State University play well enough to garner SWAC special teams player of the week for the third time this season, but following his team’s crucial 27-13 league win over Southern University in Lorman on Saturday, he got a chance to meet Wilfredo Rosales, the man whose records he has eclipsed at Alcorn.
McCullough connected on field goals fo 37 and 31 yards against the Jaguars, and was good on all four of his extra point attempts, while averaging 41 yards per punt and downing one inside the 20.
Alcorn is off this week before visiting SWAC foe Grambling on Saturday, Nov. 9 at 2 p.m.
Chris Blair, also a LHS graduate, had three catches for 108 yards for the Braves in the win over Southern.
— Austin Bishop
EXTRA MEANING FOR EGG BOWL
The Mississippi State Bulldogs (3-5) will have to beat Ole Miss in the Egg Bowl to go to a tenth straight bowl. Most of the experts predicted that State would be (5-3) at this point. Kansas State was a surprise loss, but the Wildcats are proving they are a pretty good football team, as is Tennessee. The Bulldogs are in a must-win situation this Saturday at Arkansas.
Ole Miss (3-5) was open this weekend and needs to win out to go bowling. It’s hard to see three Rebel wins with Auburn, LSU, New Mexico State and MSU left to play.
— Dale McKee
TIME FOR THE COCKTAIL PARTY
The game tabbed “The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party” will take place in Jacksonville Florida when No. 6 ranked Florida and No. 8-ranked Georgia tie up in a game that may very well decide the SEC East Champions. The game is set for 2:30 p.m. on CBS
Mississippi State travels to Arkansas to take on the Razorbacks on a 3 p.m. game set for the SEC Network, while Auburn hosts Ole Miss on ESPN at 6 p.m.
Other SEC games being televised Saturday are as follows: Texas-San Antonio at 11 a.m. on the SEC Network; UAB at Tennessee at 6 p.m. on ESPNU; and Vanderbilt at South Carolina on the SEC Network at 6:30 p.m.
— Austin Bishop
USM EARNS FIFTH WIN
Southern Mississippi (5-3) downed winless Rice by a score of 20-6 in Houston this past Saturday. The next four USM games will be hotly contested. USM is open this week, but the Eagles will have their hands full at home with UAB (6-1) on Nov. 9. Looking down the road, the Golden Eagles will be in dogfights with both Western Kentucky (5-3) and Florida Atlantic (5-3).
— Dale McKee
EMCC MAKES PLAYOFFS
On the heels of this past Thursday’s MACJC North Division results that saw Holmes score an easy homecoming win over Coahoma as well as visiting Itawamba upsetting second-ranked Northwest Mississippi by a single point, EMCC’s win over Northeast created a four-way tie atop the division between the Lions, Northwest, Holmes and ICC with identical 4-2 division marks. The MACJC’s four-way tiebreaker enabled Northwest and EMCC to secure the division’s top two seeds with respective overall records of 7-2 and 6-3.
Set to make their 11th MACJC football playoff appearance under 12th-year head coach Buddy Stephens’ guidance, the three-time reigning (2016-17-18) state champion EMCC Lions will begin defense of their state title by traveling to Perkinston to face the top-ranked and unbeaten Bulldogs of Mississippi Gulf Coast on Saturday at 7 p.m.
The other state semifinal contest will have MACJC North top seed Northwest Mississippi playing host to MACJC South runner-up Jones College on Saturday afternoon (2 p.m.) at Bobby Franklin Field in Senatobia. The MACJC championship game will be played the following Saturday (Nov. 9) at a site to be determined by this week’s state semifinal results.
— David Rosinski
HCC WOMEN REACH FINALS
The Holmes Community College Lady Bulldogs rolled to an impressive 5-1 win over Jones College on Monday to advance to Tuesday’s MACJC State Women’s Soccer Championship against Itawamba Community College.
The title game, set for 3:30 p.m at Hinds Community College in Raymond., was played after this week’s press deadline for the Winston County Journal. Looks for more information in next week’s edition of the paper.
The win, behind three goals from Caries Ellis, pushed Holmes to an impressive 16-2 overall record on the season. Holmes and Itawamba — which reached the finals with a 2-0 win over host Hinds —have played twice this season. Holmes took a 4-2 win in Ridgeland, while dropping a 3-2 decision on the road.
— Austin Bishop
UNDEFEATED LIST SHRINKING
The undefeated teams are dwindling fast each week. This week Oklahoma fell from the unbeaten ranks as Kansas State (5-2) derailed the Sooners. The week before, Wisconsin fell to Illinois, and the week before that Georgia was stunned in Athens. This week the ‘hot seat’ team may be SMU. The Mustangs (8-0) survived Houston this past week and will head to Memphis (7-1) this Saturday.
— Dale McKee
MSU HOOPS UNDERWAY
Mississippi State’s men’s and women’s basketball teams will be taking the court at Humphrey Coliseum for season-opening games this week.
The men took a narrow 78-75 exhibition win over the University of South Alabama on Saturday, while this Monday night Vick Schaefer’s women’s team will host NCAA Division II champion Lubbock Christian in an exhibition contest at 7 p.m. The MSU women will tip off the season for real at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 9 when the University of Southern Mississippi pay a visit.
The MSU men have two regular season games next week, hosting Florida International at 7 p.m. on Tuesday and Sam Houston State at 7 p.m. on Friday.
In an interesting note the Lady Chaps of Lubbock Christian certainly aren’t backing down from anybody during the three exhibition games they have scheduled before tipping off the regular season on Nov. 8. Lubbock Christian visited the University of Texas Monday, and was set to visit Baylor on Wednesday before traveling to MSU on Nov. 4.
— Austin Bishop
