(Writer’s note: On this day, 53 years ago, Hall of Famer Babe McCarthy’s Mississippi State basketball team flew out of Mississippi, secretively, to go play an NCAA Tournament game against Loyola of Chicago at East Lansing, Mich. It is known as the Game of Change. In April, of 2011, Joe Dan Gold, the Mississippi […]
Ennis Proctor this July will become only the eighth Mississippian inducted into the National High School Sports Hall of Fame. Trust me: No administrator, here or anywhere, could be more deserving. The 2016 High School Hall of Fame induction class will include such sports luminaries as Steve Spurrier and Marlin Briscoe.Proctor couldn’t throw like Spurrier […]
No surprises today at the C Spire Howell and Gillom awards luncheon: Victoria Vivians of Mississippi State won the trophy named for Peggie Gillom and Stefan Moody of Ole Miss won the trophy named for Bailey Howell. Both were repeat winners and both were deserving — and then some. Both players have brought much joy […]
Stefan Moody doesn’t have a vote for the C Spire Howell Trophy, but he cast a ballot the best way he knew how Wednesday night in Oxford. Moody, a senior playing on Senior Night, poured in 43 points to lead the Ole Miss Rebels to an 86-78 victory over arch-rival Mississippi State. Fellow Howell Trophy […]
Last week’s death of Mississippi Sports Hall of Famer Jim Davenport brought a barrage of memories, all good ones. His nickname was Peanuts. Don’t know how he got it, and, for some reason, I never asked. My daddy just called him “Nuts” and it seemed as natural as Sam or Joe to me. Davenport was […]
So, I read where draft nerd Mel Kiper has questions about Laquon Treadwell’s speed. Says he needs to run a fast 40-yard dash at the NFL combine to solidify his position as the top wide receiver in the draft. Here’s my beef with that: That’s placing far too much emphasis on how fast a football […]
We lost another Mississippi Sports Hall of Famer this week and I wish my father were here to write this obit. Jim Davenport was a close friend of my late father, Ace Cleveland. Davenport, nicknamed Peanuts, was a baseball and football star at Southern Miss in the early 1950s and later a Gold Glove third […]
We lost the ineffable Willie Richardson last week, dead at age 76, a football legend surely beloved by all who knew him, no matter their allegiances. Richardson was a Jackson State man whose playing career takes us back to a different time in Mississippi and America when historically black colleges in the Deep South were […]
