East Mississippi touts MACJC Academic All-State teams for all sports; 22 EMCC student-athletes honored

JACKSON – Bolstered by 22 student-athletes earning MACJC Academic All-State individual honors, all six of East Mississippi Community College's athletic teams affiliated with the Mississippi Association of Community and Junior Colleges have garnered MACJC Academic All-State team recognition for the fifth consecutive year.  The 2014-15 state-wide junior college academic all-state selections were announced Friday by MACJC Commissioner Jim Southward.

Coach Kyndall White's EMCC softball squad, two-time NJCAA Softball Academic Team of the Year recipients, once again paced all East Mississippi sports teams with a 3.43 composite grade point average.  Also generating a team cumulative GPA of 3.00 or better for the fifth straight year, first-year head coach Benji Williams' Lion golf team registered a collective 3.09 team grade point average.

Along with having claimed three national football championships in the last four years, head coach Buddy Stephens' EMCC Lions earned top state-wide football honors in the classroom as well this past academic year.  East Mississippi paced all 14 MACJC member schools that currently field football teams with a program-best 2.93 composite team GPA for the second consecutive year.  The reigning back-to-back national football champions also led all MACJC schools with 10 academic football honorees during the 2014-15 campaign. 

Setting program-high marks dating back to when the MACJC began acknowledging academic all-state honors in 2010-11, head coach Chris Rose's EMCC baseball team and the Lion basketball squad followed with respective team composite grade point averages of 3.07 and 3.04.  Coach Sharon Thompson's Lady Lion basketball club also compiled a 3.04 team GPA for the program's highest mark since the 2011-12 season. 

Including last year's school-record 31 academic honorees, East Mississippi Community College has now totaled 53 MACJC Academic All-State selections over the past two years combined.  EMCC's softball team followed football with a half-dozen selections, while baseball and men's golf added four and two recipients, respectively.    

Individually, four EMCC student-athletes from four different sports collected Distinguished MACJC Academic All-State honors for posting composite grade point averages of 3.80 or higher.  With Ole Miss football walk-on Jacob Feeley (Picayune) and Delta State softball walk-on Kasey Stanfield (New Hope HS) leading the way with respective cumulative GPAs of 3.92 and 3.91, baseball pitcher Nathaniel Willers (Maben) and all-state golfer Steven Eilders (Ridgeland) followed closely with marks of 3.86 and 3.82, respectively, for East Mississippi.

Other EMCC student-athletes collecting 2014-15 MACJC Academic All-State accolades (3.25-3.79 GPA) were: Drew Standland (3.79-baseball); Justin Lucas (3.67-football); Evan Grimes (3.65-football); Kristen Mitchell (3.64-softball); Cody Allsup (3.56-baseball); William Lloyd (3.55-football); Logan Smith (3.52-softball); Whitney Lowe (3.49-softball); Pepper Baker (3.41-softball); Hunter Harmon (3.41-men's golf); DeShawn Tillman (3.37-football); Hunter Brannan (3.34-baseball); Michael Hodges Jr. (3.30-football); Isaac Johnson (3.30-football); Kameron Myers (3.28-football); JaQarius Scott (3.28-football); Anna McCrary (3.26-softball); and Chris Berry (3.25-football).