Both Noxapater basketball teams were able to pick up their first wins this past week at the Red Hills Showdown held at Winston Academy.
The Tigers beat Starkville Christian 39-25 while the Lady Tigers defeated Grace Christian 39-15.
Noxapater will return to action this week as they travel to Union on Tuesday. On Thursday and Friday, they will participate in the Ethel Tournament. They will take on host Ethel on Thursday night with the girls playing at 7 p.m. and boys at 8:30 p.m. Nanih Waiya and Sebastopol are playing on the other side of the brackets. Winners play the late games on Friday and losers play the early games starting at 4 p.m.
The Tigers split a pair of games last week as they beat Starkville Christian 39-25 and lost to Sebastopol 53-34.
“We played a lot better in the second half against Starkville,” coach Jerrick Porter said. “We starting doing the small things that we talk about every day. They are starting to see that everything they do on the court matters.”
Against Starkville, each team scored 10 points in the first and the Tigers pulled ahead in the second to lead 19-12 at the half. The Tigers outscored Starkville 8-6 in the third and 12-7 in the fourth to take the win.
Jordan Wilkes led the Tigers with 16 points while K.D. Carter ha nine points. Ryan Whitfield had seven points while Chris Roberts had four points and Ryan Glasgow had three points.
No stats were available for the Sebastopol game.
The Lady Tigers grabbed their first win with a 39-15 win over Grace Christian and lost 44-13 to Sebastopol.
“The girls played good enough to win,” Porter said. “It was good to get the win. We still have a lot of inexperience. Hopefully we can take this win and build on it and build some confidence. But it was good to get the win and get that off our backs.”
Against Grace, Noxapater led 14-4 at the end of the first and 24-6 at the half as the Lady Tigers cruised to the win.
Jenna Wilkes had 10 points to lead the Lady Tigers while Morgan Hunter, Kaylan Brown and Morgan Duran each had four points apiece.
