No. 12 EMCC Lions travel to No. 2 Northwest bidding for eighth conference football title
Bidding for their eighth conference football championship in the past 14 years, the 12th-ranked Lions of East Mississippi Community College will take on second-ranked Northwest Mississippi in Saturday’s MACCC Football Championship Game to be played in Senatobia. Kickoff is set for 2 p.m. at Ranger Stadium at Bobby Franklin Field.
SCOOBA – Bidding for their eighth conference football championship in the past 14 years, the 12th-ranked Lions of East Mississippi Community College will take on second-ranked Northwest Mississippi in Saturday's MACCC Football Championship Game to be played in Senatobia. Kickoff is set for 2 p.m. at Ranger Stadium at Bobby Franklin Field.
The EMCC Lions are 7-3 overall on the year after securing the No. 2 seed in the MACCC's North Division and then advancing to their eighth conference (MACCC/MACJC) title game by way of last Saturday's 38-27 road win over MACCC South Division champion Mississippi Gulf Coast. The two-time reigning conference champion Northwest Rangers are unbeaten through 10 games and moved on to the championship contest by virtue of their narrow 38-35 home victory over No. 2 MACCC South seed Jones College last Saturday.
Statistically on the year, Northwest (36.5 ppg) and EMCC (36.4 ppg) are ranked third and fourth, respectively, in scoring offense among NJCAA Division I teams. The Rangers and Lions are also neck and neck nationally in total offense, with Northwest and EMCC ranked sixth and seventh, respectively, by averaging 416.2 and 408.7 total yards of offense an outing.
Individually on offense, Saturday's championship contest figures to pit EMCC freshman quarterback Eli Anderson against Northwest transfer signal-caller Ren Hefley, out of Presbyterian College via Little Rock, Ark. Anderson and Hefley are ranked fourth and sixth among the NJCAA Division I passing leaders with averages of 216.1 and 205.7 yards per game through the air, respectively. In addition, Anderson is rated second nationally in pass completion percentage (69.5%), while Hefley is second with 21 passing touchdowns (behind MGCCC's Pat McQuaide [24]).
Defensively, EMCC is tied for the nation's team lead in NJCAA Division I (w/Hutchinson & Kilgore) with 17 total interceptions on the season, including a season-high four picks during last week's playoff win at Gulf Coast. Northwest is tied for sixth nationally with 15 INTs for the year.
Individually on defense, EMCC's Reggie Neely and Northwest's Byron Pearson are currently in a four-way tie for second place nationally with five interceptions each – one behind Jones' Lardarius Webb. Additionally, EMCC's current NJCAA and MACCC Defensive Player of the Week Steven Cattledge Jr. presently leads the NJCAA Division I defensive ranks with 109 total tackles on the season.
Saturday's EMCC-NWCC conference championship clash will mark the 13th meeting in the past 15 seasons that both teams have been nationally ranked when going head-to-head, which includes 10 times when both teams owned top 10 rankings at game time. The Lions own a 7-3 record against the Rangers in those previous top 10 matchups, though Northwest claimed the 38-21 road win over EMCC back on Sept. 29 of this year in Scooba.
Coach Buddy Stephens, now in his 15th year as head coach of the Lions, owns a 12-4 career record versus Northwest Mississippi dating back to the 2008 season, including back-to-back conference championship wins (2016 & 2017) over the Rangers when both teams were ranked top five nationally. The Lions prevailed, 38-30, in the 2016 title game played in Scooba and then came back the following year to earn a memorable 67-66 double-overtime road thriller over the Rangers in the 2017 championship contest played in Senatobia.
Stephens' EMCC Lions are 7-1 over Northwest in road games since 2008, including last year's 30-21 win in Senatobia. The Lions' lone road loss to the Rangers during the Stephens era came in 2017 when Northwest prevailed, 61-38, during the regular season prior to EMCC returning to Senatobia two months later and avenging the 23-point setback to repeat as conference champions.
Dating back to the 2008 football season, EMCC and Northwest have combined to claim each of the previous 15 MACCC North Division regular-season championships between them. The Lions have won 10 of those division titles, while the Rangers have earned the other five MACCC North crowns. Aided by the Lions' seven conference championships since 2009 and five national titles during an eight-year span (2011-18), East Mississippi and Northwest Mississippi also head into Saturday's title game having combined to account for 10 MACCC football championships in the last 13 years along with six NJCAA titles over the last 11 seasons.
Under Stephens' direction since 2008, the EMCC Lions own a 15-5 composite conference playoff record with seven championships and five semifinal-round finishes. Along with the previous back-to-back championship game wins over Northwest in 2016 and 2017, East Mississippi's other league title game victories have come against Mississippi Gulf Coast (2009 & 2011), Jones (2013 & 2018) and Copiah-Lincoln (2014).
Saturday's EMCC-Northwest title tilt will be broadcast live by WFCA-FM (107.9), out of French Camp, with Glen Beard slated to call the play-by-play action and EMCC men's basketball coach Billy Begley set to provide the color commentary. The game's live-streamed audio will also be carried by EMCC's campus radio station, WGTC-FM (92.7), originating from the Golden Triangle campus in Mayhew. In addition, EMCC's live video streamed football broadcast will be available in HD at emcclive.com. An alternate audio stream of the radio broadcast will also be available at wfca.fm.
