By Nick Nunn
Staff Writer

This week, the MCMS Boys and Girls Basketball teams competed in preseason games against Taliaferro Middle School and Memorial Middle School. The girls’ team won both of their games, and the boys came out with a 1-1 preseason record.
The teams traveled to Taliaferro on Friday, where the girls’ team secured a 33-6 victory.
Tatyana Davis led Morgan County in scoring with 10 points during the game. Sarah Couch and Autumn Woodard each scored six points for the team.
The boys’ team beat Taliaferro 33-29.
Lamarcus Stokes, Jordan Huff, and Willie Simmons were the high scorers contributing to the boys’ victory. They scored nine, seven and five points, respectively. 
The games against Memorial Middle SChoon took place at Morgan County Middle School on Saturday.
Again, the girls’ team won their game, beating Memorial 33-10, but the boys lost to Memorial 28-34.
The girls’ team took an early 19-1 lead against Memorial in the first half of the game, and Memorial wasn’t able to mount much of a comeback in the second half. The game ended 33-10.
Again, Davis led the scoring, this time with 13 points in the game. Alisha Ellis came in a close second with 10 points during the game.
The boys’ game against Memorial was hard fought, but ultimately ended in failure.
At the end of the first quarter, Memorial had a big 11-4 lead. In the second quarter, both teams scored only two points, making the score 13-6.
Morgan County began scoring more in the second half with 12 points in the third quarter and 10 points in the last quarter, but it wasn’t enough to overcome Memorial, who won 34-28.
Milfred Franklin, the coach for the boys’ team emphasized the beneficial role that the preseason games will have on his team.
“Having two preseason games allowed us to get a head start on the areas we need to work on before the regular season starts,” said Coach Franklin. “It gave the players some good experience and it allowed them to get a first hand experience of the game atmosphere.” 
“We have a lot of size and we will look to use that to our advantage this season.  The main focus we are looking to work on is communication on the defensive end and guarding the ball.”
Although a large part of the girls’ team played last year, Brian Cousins, the head coach of the girls’ team, also acknowledged that the preseason games helped him to judge the team’s progress so far this year.
“Seven players are returning from last years’ team that went undefeated,” noted Coach Cousins.  “The returning players have a firm grasp of what is expected of them this year and have picked up right where they left off.  Our newcomers have come in and are really putting forth a lot of effort.”
“We will have a deeper bench than we did last year, which will really help with our up-tempo defense and offense.”
The first regular season game for the Middle School basketball teams will be against Greene County on Wednesday, November 28 in Greene County.

Printed in the November 15, 2012 edition