Sikeston downs NMCC for a fifth place finish

Turnovers spoil Eagle upset bid as SHS moves to 8-2

POPLAR BLUFF -- The Sikeston Bulldogs wrapped up the 2008 Poplar Bluff Showdown

with a fifth place finish by defeating the New Madrid County Central Eagles 56-44 on Wednesday afternoon. The win is the second by the Bulldogs over the Eagles in the 2008-2009 basketball season.

Sikeston and NMCC battled for four quarters before the Bulldogs finally pulled away in the middle of the fourth for the win. The Eagles brought a lot of pressure from the opening tip as they were even at 13-13 after one quarter of play.

Sikeston head coach Gregg Holifield acknowledged the fact that NMCC came out gunning for the Bulldogs and said that their third meeting with the Eagles, later in the regular season, will be very difficult.

Heading into halftime Sikeston managed to pull ahead by three, 26-23, as Will Holifield knocked down a field goal as time expired in the second quarter. The momentum seemed to carry the Bulldogs into the second half where they outscored NMCC 16-11 in the third and 14-10 in the fourth to hold on for the 12-point victory.

"It's exactly what I expected," said Coach Holifield of the fifth place finish. "(In the) 2:30 p.m. consolation bracket, it's just about what I expected. I've been coaching for 20 years and usually the 2:30 p.m. consolation side this is exactly what you get. (I thought we played) sloppy, (and) at times we played well and at times we didn't."

"New Madrid is a quality team," he went on to say. "I think they are a really good team and Coach Day has done a great job with them. They play as hard and as tough as anybody we go against. Our kids know that and our kids have a lot of respect for their team."

Once again in the tournament the Bulldogs were led by Michael Porter, who finished with 15 points and five rebounds. Cal Lane had another good performance with 10 points and two blocked shots while Darryl Howard also got in double figures with 10 points. Howard also had seven steals out of the total 16 racked up by Sikeston in the win.

Eli Jackson also got into double digits in scoring with 10 points and Will Holifield was 2-for-3 from beyond the arc and finished the game one point shy of double figures with nine points.

"We let another team off the hook with our turnovers," said NMCC head coach Travis Day. "We're making some unforced turnovers that we shouldn't be making right now. If we knock that out then we're capable of being a pretty good team."

"We know that everything we're doing will work, we've just got to take care of the ball and not give them the opportunities to pull away from us like we did," he added.

One thing that the Eagles learned from the tournament was that they can compete with a high caliber team such as Sikeston, now 8-2 on the season. NMCC had control of the game several times and maintained a lead until the turnover bug bit in the second half. The Eagles finished with 25 turnovers while the Bulldogs committed just 16. Sikeston scored 29 points off of NMCC turnovers.

"We showed what we're capable of when we're taking care of the ball and playing

good defense," Day said. "Our thing was to go in there and pack the paint and make them (Sikeston) earn it. We did that in the first half, we made them earn everything they got. In the second half we just came out and had too many turnovers."

One stat that NMCC controlled despite the loss was total rebounds. They out-rebounded Sikeston 22-20 and were led in the category by G'Darius Stevenson with six rebounds. Josh Minner led the Eagles with 18 points and had two blocked shots and three steals.

The two teams will meet up again Feb. 17. Coming up next week Sikeston will be in Charleston on Friday night while NMCC, now 6-4 on the season, will travel to Blytheville Tuesday evening.