By Robert Wilson
When talented 6-foot-10 sophomore center EJ Dampier fouled with 6 minutes, 41 seconds to play in the fourth quarter, some might have thought Hartfield Academy could come back and defeat Madison-Ridgeland Academy and spoil legendary MRA coach Richard Duease’s storybook ending of trying to win a MAIS Overall Tournament championship in his final season.
They thought wrong.
Not only did Dampier’s teammates keep the lead, they stretched it and went on to defeat Hartfield 54-35 in the Overall semifinals before an estimated 2,000 at Mississippi College’s A.E. Wood Coliseum/Mike Jones Court in Clinton to put Duease one win away from another Overall title.
Duease – the winningest basketball coach in Mississippi history and a member of the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame – is returning this season after 51 years of being a head coach, the last 44 at MRA.
The 74-year-old Indianola High, Mississippi Delta Community College and Mississippi State graduate has 1,887 victories (1,295 boys and 592 girls) with 725 losses, a 72.1 winning percentage, with 42 state championships and 15 MAIS Overall Tournament titles (13 boys and two girls) in his career. He has won 1,247 boys and 439 girls games at MRA.
MRA – ranked No. 2 in Mississippi and No. 1 among MAIS Class 4A teams by MaxPreps – improved to 35-2, won its 18th game in a row and meets Class 4A, Division II champion Jackson Academy for the championship Tuesday at 7:45 p.m. JA defeated Leake Academy 57-46 in Monday’s other semifinal.
MRA defeated JA 66-55 Dec. 2 at MRA in the only meeting this season, The other regular season game at JA was cancelled because of the winter storm.
MRA’s only two losses are to MHSAA Class 5A Columbus High, ranked No. 5 in Mississippi, and Zachary High, the No. 1 rated team in Louisiana by MaxPreps.
Class 4A, Division II runner-up Hartfield finished 23-11, including three losses to MRA in three meetings this season.
Dampier – a member of the Team USA 16-under team, the No. 3 ranked player in the country in the Class of 2028 by ESPN, and the son of former Mississippi State and NBA star Erick Dampier, now an assistant coach at MRA – picked up his fifth foul with MRA leading 41-30, giving Hartfield a chance at a fourth-quarter comeback.
But Dampier’s teammates picked up the slack, and outscored Hartfield 13-5 for the rest of the game. After Dampier fouled out with 9 points, 12 rebounds and 5 blocked shots, MRA went on an 11-0 run to go ahead 52-30 and put the game away. Senior guard Will Bizot made two free throws, sophomore guard Caeden Harvey hit a 3-pointer and a layup, junior guard Zavian Carr made a shot and Bizot followed with baseline jumper.
“Will is our one senior left playing with our other senior, Evan Carr, out (after having surgery for a broken jaw),” Duease said. “Will refuses to lose now and he wants to win a championship. We have one more night. Camden is just a sophomore and he played well, also. This is a special night for our players. I’m happy we have gotten this far and I hope it works out. We are a good passing team and we play good defense.”
If MRA wins the championship, it will be the first Overall title for Duease since 2021, the longest drought since Duease didn’t an Overall from 1999 to 2005. He won an amazing 10 titles in a 14 year span from 2005 to 2018.
Clutch shots like what Bizot did Monday will help finished Duease’s career on high note.
Bizot finished a team-high 14 points, all in the second half, with 4 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 steals and numerous deflections. He stepped it up when Dampier fouled out.
“E (Dampier) is a crucial part of our team and was a big part of our success tonight,” said Bizot, whose father, Kenny Bizot, is the Mississippi College athletic director and also won three Overall titles (2000, 2001 and 2003) as head coach at Hillcrest Christian. “When he fouled out, we knew it would be a bigger challenge getting rebounds, but as a team we stepped up and made big shots and went on a 10-0 run which speaks a lot of volume about how much everyone on our team believes that whoever is in wil produce. For Coach Duease to end his incredible career winning his last game to win the gold ball would be awesome. We will all be playing for him tomorrow.”
In addition to Dampier and Bizot, Harvey had 14 points (5 of 8 from the field, 4 of 7 from 3-point range), with 6 rebounds and 6 assists and junior guard Jack Dalton had 10 points.
MRA led 14-6 after one quarter, 26-18 at halftime and 41-30 after three quarters despite Dampier being in four trouble for much of the game.
“MRA is a really good team,” said third-year Hartfield coach Chris Goodman. “We knew that we had our work cut out for us to be able to defend and rebound against them. Our goal was to try to control the pace and try to frustrate them throughout the game on both offense and defense. We did an OK job on that. Credit to Coach Duease and MRA. They always had the answer. Even when we fouled out EJ, MRA responded well and extended the lead after he went out.”
Junior BJ Jones led Hartfield with 11 points.
“The end of the year is always tough, outside of the one team who gets to celebrate,” Goodman said. “I am beyond proud of my guys for responding to each moment of adversity, playing tough each night, loving, trusting, and believing in each other. I hate it for my seniors – Pepper (Wilson), Noah (Sensing), Sam (Sykes) and Summit (Singleton), our student manager. Through blood, sweat and tears, those guys just kept showing up. I love those guys and am so proud of all they accomplished throughout their careers. Back to back trips to the semifinals of Overall is just a feather in their caps.”
