By Robert Wilson
Presbyterian Christian School is moving from the MAIS (Mississippi Association of Independent Schools) to the MHSAA (Mississippi High School Athletic Association) next school year, largely due to concerns regarding the amount of travel it faced, the inadequacies in the MAIS 6A classification regarding travel, and in some sports PCS’ ability to be competitive in this classification, PCS head of school Jimmy Messer told Mississippi Scoreboard.
PCS announced in late August it was moving from the MAIS to the MHSAA, starting in the 2025-2026 school year. The MHSAA, like the MAIS, are on two-year cycles so the school would have to stay in the MHSAA for at least two years before they decide whether to remain in the MHSAA or come back to the MAIS. PCS is eligible for the playoffs next school year.
Messer said PCS started seriously looking into the possibility to moving to the MHSAA in August of 2023.
“Conversations have been taking place between administration at PCS and our families for several years,” said Messer, who is in his second year as the head of school at PCS after being the athletic director at Jackson Academy for one year. Messer spent his entire life as a coach and administrator in Alabama and Georgia before he moved to Mississippi three years ago.
“The MAIS has been involved and were very aware of these conversations. Concerns regarding the amount of travel we faced, the inadequacies in the MAIS 6A classification regarding travel, and in some sports our ability to be competitive in this classification.”
Messer said PCS administration and coaches have talked to several schools in both the MAIS and MSHAA about the positives and negatives of making a move to the MSHAA.
“Former PCS head of school Dr. Allan Smithers has been consulted regarding PCS and our situation the past few years,” Messer said. “(Head of school) David Horner of Hartfield and I have discussed their past journey regarding athletic association relationships.
“Our process started out with a meeting with MAIS staff to voice our concerns and to see what possible MAIS classification changes they were considering. After that meeting, we met with MHSAA leadership to explore the possibility of us joining. This including insuring we would keep our independence regarding and control of our Christian teaching values, academics, and teacher certification. We explored our possible classification and who might be in our region, while also learning the eligibility rules of the MHSAA. After these meetings we met with our head coaches to see where they stood on the possibility of changing associations.”
Messer said they spent the next few months looking into several issues like the amount of travel, the amount of class time missed by students, the financial impact on the school with all of the travel, and the level of competitiveness of their teams in 6A of MAIS.
“We looked at our relationships within the MAIS and how the change could affect PCS outside of the athletic arena,” Messer said. “We rejoined the Southern Association of Independent Schools (SAIS) to insure we would have an accreditation agency that met our standards and those of both organizations.
“In the recent months, leading up to our decision, we held two town halls with our families. We allowed them to send in questions about the possible move and to share their thoughts and concerns. After completion of the town halls, we sent out a survey to all our parents, which allowed them the opportunity to provide feedback as to which factors they felt we most important for us to consider when making our final decision.
“The last step before making a recommendation to our board, included a final meeting with both the executive director of the MHSAA and the MAIS. (MAIS executive director) Shane Blanton was the last person we met with outside of PCS and members of our school board were included in this meeting.”
PCS is only school in the six school MAIS Class 6A not to be in the Metro Jackson area. The others are Hartfield Academy in Flowood, Jackson Academy in Northeast Jackson, Jackson Prep in Flowood, Madison-Ridgeland Academy in Madison and Madison St. Joseph.
This is the second year that those six schools were in Class 6A. Before that Parklane Academy in McComb was in 6A instead of St. Joe, which was about 30 minutes closer to PCS than St. Joe.
“The “big 4” in Jackson are great schools and we have a lot of respect for them, but the travel and other factors of being in the classification with Prep, JA, MRA and Hartfield, did factor in,” Messer said. “I believe other MAIS schools have looked at keeping their enrollment at a certain level to insure they were not included in the current 6A classification. While I believe the current 6A classification may have been considered successful for others, in our opinion it has not been beneficial to PCS, our student athletes and our families.
“In regard to travel, in other classifications there seemed to be more equality. For PCS, each year the cost of travel is different as charter bus prices have increased. We spend between $65,000 and $75,000 on travel within our conference. We did have five one hour, 40-minute trips or more in the league and they each had one.
“In the end, travel time and missed class time played a greater role than the finances of the travel. Football plays on Fridays and does not miss the amount of class that other sports do. However, our teams that play on Tuesdays and Thursdays, do miss a lot of class time and we believe the wear and tear on them over the course of a season or seasons, does have an impact on our students.”
Messer said he believes PCS will be in MHSAA Class 3A, but not sure yet who will be in its region.
“The region closest to us included Perry Central (23 minutes away), West Marion (47 minutes), St Patrick’s (56 minutes) and St Stanislaus (one hour, 24 minutes). This could change due to enrollment shifts. Our current 6A MAIS travel is Hartfield (one hour, 48 minutes), Prep (one hour, 44 minutes), JA (one hour, 44 minutes), MRA (one hour, 52 minutes) and St Joe (one hour, 50 minutes).
“For some sports (tennis, golf, soccer, and some others) we will most likely be in a classification with Sacred Heart (located in Hattiesburg).”
Some other MAIS schools, for example JA and Prep, have explored looking to move to the MHSAA, but decided to remain in the MAIS.
“I spoke to (JA head of school) Palmer Kennedy and I also spoke to current and former administration at JA who were a part of that decision,” Messer said. “We sat down with (Prep head of school) Lawrence Coco and (Prep athletic director) Will Crosby to talk about multiple things regarding our decision.”
Unlike the MAIS, the MHSAA has eligibility restrictions for private schools. They must be in a certain radius of the school to be eligible to play sports.
“Our district is a 20-mile radius (straight line distance),” Messer said. “All our current students are eligible regardless of where they live and, in the future, students who have been a part of our system will be eligible moving up regardless of where they live. The biggest difference is for new ninth graders (they need to live with 20 miles) are eligible. New 10th, 11th or 12th grader would not be eligible immediately if they transfer even if they lived within 20 miles unless they met certain requirements in regard to a relocation. If someone was interested in transferring to PCS, I would encourage them to reach out and we can look at their individual situation and share the rules with them.”
Presbyterian Christian is the only MAIS school in the Hattiesburg area and athletes from MHSAA schools in the area like Oak Grove, Hattiesburg, Petal, Stone County, Collins, South Jones, Sumrall, and Seminary have transferred to PCS in the past several years and became eligible immediately. With PCS being in the MHSAA, those same athletes would have to sit out a year to be eligible when they transferred to PCS or could be eligible if they moved within the 20-mile area.
The MHSAA has a handful of private and parochial schools in their association like St. Andrew’s Episcopal in Ridgeland, Sacred Heart Catholic in Hattiesburg, St. Patrick Catholic in Biloxi, and St Stanislaus Catholic in Bay St. Louis, French Camp Academy and Tupelo Christian.
PCS has played many schools from the MHSAA while it was a member of the MAIS in many sports and Messer said they will continue to play schools from both associations.
“I think our schedule will continue to be a combination,” Messer said. “We hope to continue our relationships with many of the MAIS schools. I have already spoken to several who have expressed that they too, would like to continue to play. We also hope that outside our region, we can build relationships with more MHSAA schools.”
The PCS boys cross country team won 6A two of three last seasons. In the 2023-2024 school year, PCS also finished second in girls basketball and boys soccer, third in softball, fourth in boys basketball and volleyball, and fifth in football and girls soccer.
One of the biggest highlights in the past several years was the PCS girls basketball team, which was the 6A state runner-up and Overall Tournament runner-up in 2023 and 6A state consolation winner and Overall semifinalist last season. The Lady Bobcats were led by 6A Player of the Year Addyson Sherer, daughter of boys basketball coach Josh Sherer. Addyson, now a freshman at William Carey University in Hattiesburg, scored 2,750 career points and is considered one of the best athletes in school history.
“Change can be difficult, especially if leadership, culture and community isn’t healthy, but that isn’t the case at PCS,” said Josh Sherer, who has been at PCS since 2019 and has coached MAIS schools Lamar School in Meridian and Central Hinds Academy in Raymond during his coaching career. “Thankfully, we have incredible momentum for our leaders to take us to a place that this institution has never been.”
“From a competitive standpoint, we are confident we can compete with most anyone in the state in girls basketball,” PCS girls basketball coach Drew Smith said. “We don’t care what league or classification we are in from that standpoint. Our (MAIS) 6A and 5A leagues are as tough as any with coaching legends we face very night. Coaches like Jan Sojourner (of JA), Michael McAnally (of Prep), and Stephen Force (of MRA), have made me a better coach, and have given me confidence to go toe to toe with anyone. I hope we can continue a few non-conference games with them in the future.
“As with anything new, I think there are some uncertainties going forward. However, I’m ultimately excited for our school and our student athletes. This decision is all about their well-being. Our conference games are in Jackson. The Jackson schools basically have one true conference away game. Our kids are consistently getting home at midnight and having to go to class the next morning. For us, we practice at 7 a.m. every day, which obviously makes a practice tough for the following morning.”
The girls finished 27-10 overall and the boys finished 25-11. PCS basketball teams played 11 games against MHSAA teams last season. The girls were 6-5 and the boys were 8-3 against MHSAA competition.
PCS baseball program is on the upswing with fourth-year coach and former Southern Miss star Jarrett Hoffpauir. The Bobcats had their best season yet last spring when they finished 27-11 and lost to nationally ranked Jackson Prep and Major League Baseball first round draft pick Konnor Griffin in the 6A state championship series. PCS is led by junior pitcher Bankston Walters, one of the best players in Mississippi in the Class of 2026.
“I think it’s a great move for our school,” Hoffpauir said. “There were many factors that came into play that we had to consider before making a decision. We had to look at everything and make sure it made sense for our entire school, not just specific sports. We’re looking forward to cutting down on travel and having a more traditional playoff system where your regular season district play determines if you make it or not. That will be a change for us, but it’s a challenge that we’re excited about.”
The football team has not won more than one conference game since 2016 and has a 6-29 record during that span. A year ago, PCS lost to Hartfield 42-6, MRA 56-10, JA 62-22 and Prep 49-0 and defeated St. Joe 40-39. PCS has played two conference games so far this season, losing to Hartfield 71-0 and Prep 56-10.
PCS, led by then coach Joey Hawkins, finished 11-1 in 2016 and defeated JA, MRA and Prep during the regular season and lost to Prep in the state semifinals.
Hawkins’ team that year was led by running back Isaiah Woullard, who gained 2,761 yards and scored 36 touchdowns as a senior, and had a Mississippi record 8,334 yards and 93 TDs during his four-year career. Woullard is one of the best athletes in PCS history.
“Coaching and teaching in public schools for over 20 years, I see us becoming a better version of us along with increasing those around us,” second-year PCS football coach Michael Brown. “We will begin a change of pace, place, and perspective. It will give us a diversity in opponents, while playing teams within our locality and building new relationships. As a mission driven school and program, we strive to follow the word in Matthew 15:16 and ‘Let our light shine.’’’
