EMCC men place third and EMCC women finish fifth during Arkansas-Monticello rodeo

MONTICELLO, Ark. – Highlighted by a second straight team roping win for transfer cowboys Colt Fisher and Justin Pruitt, the East Mississippi Community College men's rodeo team placed third at the eighth annual Boll Weevil Stampede this past weekend.  The three-day event, hosted by the University of Arkansas at Monticello, concluded Saturday night at the Drew County Fairgrounds.               

While the EMCC men finished third in the 10-team field with 315 points, the EMCC women placed fifth out of nine teams with 150 points.  The Tennessee-Martin men (710 points) and Troy women (405 points) claimed the respective team titles during the second Ozark Region event of the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association's spring schedule.

Fisher, from Sulphur, La., and Pruit, of Greenbrier, Ark., captured their second consecutive team roping victory since becoming eligible to compete for the spring semester.  After winning two weeks ago with a pair of 6.1-second efforts during their EMCC debut in Texarkana, Ark., the tandem posted a winning time of 6.4 seconds in the short-go round this past weekend in Monticello.

With their back-to-back team roping victories during their first two collegiate competitions, EMCC's Fisher and Pruitt already rank third among their respective header and heeler event region standings with 320 points apiece.   

Also in men's competition for East Mississippi this past weekend, Fisher and Cody Simmons each scored in the calf roping event, while former Oak Hill Academy product Palmer White won the steer wrestling competition with a first-place time of 3.3 seconds in the short-go round.

For the EMCC women's rodeo team, Kory Ann McCuiston and Katelyn Nicholson combined for 150 points in three different events.  Both cowgirls scored in the goat tying competition, while McCuiston collected 60 points in breakaway roping and Nicholson earned 40 points in barrel racing.

McCuiston, currently living in Greenbrier, Ark., ranks fourth among the Ozark Region's breakaway roping individual standings with 235 points.

Coach Morgan Goodrich's East Mississippi rodeo teams continue competition this week (March 13-15) at Southern Arkansas University before hosting their own Ozark Region rodeo event in two weeks (March 27-29) in West Point.