No. 8 EMCC men open hoops season with 97-57 win over Georgia Highlands

SCOOBA – The eighth-ranked Lions of East Mississippi Community College tipped off the 2012-13 basketball season Thursday evening with a convincing 97-57 home win over Georgia Highlands College at Keyes T. Currie Coliseum on the Scooba campus.

Ranked No. 8 in the NJCAA Top 25 preseason men's poll, head coach Mark White's EMCC Lions led the entire contest.  After jumping out to an early 14-2 lead, the three-time reigning NJCAA Region 23 champions maintained a comfortable 51-28 halftime advantage.

The Lions managed to double-up the visiting Chargers, 60-30, by the 16:25 mark of the second stanza.  The cushion ballooned to 40 points (76-36) with 12 minutes still remaining in the contest as EMCC coasted to the 40-point, season-opening triumph.

Sophomore swing man Jarekious Bradley led all scorers with 25 points, including 16 in the opening half.  The former Midland College (Texas) transfer by way of Memphis East High School registered a double-double in his EMCC debut by adding 13 rebounds.

Former Brandon High School product Trey Brown tallied 13 of his 18 points in the second half, while freshman guard Jacolby Mobley, of Starkville, scored 11 of his 14 points following the intermission.  Sophomore guard A.J. Wade, from Northeast Lauderdale, rounded out the quartet of double-digit Lion scorers with a dozen points.

In playing its first game as a collegiate team after the school established an athletics program during the summer, Georgia Highlands was led by Damon Mitchell and Femi Ojuolape with 19 and 16 points, respectively.