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By Robert Wilson
Photos by Brad Bridges
Mo Williams was known at Murrah High, Alabama and in his 13 seasons in the NBA as a point guard who didn’t let pressure get to him and handled the big moments.
So it should come as no surprise that Mo’s sons – Jackson Academy sophomore point guard Mason and JA junior guard Mike – has the same skill set.
Said Mason: “I’m more obsessed with pressure than letting it get to me. When I see pressure, I laugh at it. I start laughing because I love it so much.”
Those were some of Mason’s comments after he scored a career-high 27 points to lead JA to an impressive 69-47 victory over previously undefeated Madison-Ridgeland Academy in a highly anticipated MAIS Class 6A conference game Wednesday night before a standing room only crowd of 2,200 at JA’s Raiderdome and Jan Sojourner Court in Northeast Jackson.
JA improved to 22-1 overall and 3-0 in league play. MRA dropped to 24-1 and 2-1 in league play.
JA won its eighth game in a row since a 70-59 loss to MHSAA Class 6A state title contender Pascagoula in the BASSA Invitational Dec. 23. The Raiders played without Mason Williams, who was out with a bruised knee.
“We wanted this one,” Mason Williams said. “They were ranked higher than us because we had lost that one game and I didn’t play in it.”
Mason – who missed five games – played Wednesday and was the star of the night. He scored JA’s first seven points and had 17 at halftime. At half, he had made 7 of 10 shots from the field, 3 of 5 from 3-point range, with 3 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals.
With his older brother Mike being face guarded by MRA’s Jas Smith, Mason took over the scoring role.
Mason came in only averaging 8.2 points per game but scored that many in the first quarter. He made 11 of 15 shots from the field, 5 of 7 from 3-point range, with 7 rebounds, 5 assists and 4 steals. He had had only two games where he scored more than 10 points this season, 15 against Hartfield Academy and 12 against Bowling Green, La.
Mason scored the first five points in the second half to ignite JA on an 20-2 run as JA rallied from a 32-27 halftime lead to take a 47-34 lead with 2 minutes to play in the third quarter.
“Coach (second-year JA coach Jesse Taylor) got on us at halftime and we came out strong in the second half,” Mason said. “We kept it going and didn’t back down. We stopped giving up 3s. (MRA junior guard) Jas (Smith) was killing us (he finished with a team-high 21 points). We got together on as team, and we got our offense going and knocking down shots and continue over to the defense with our energy. Coach always tells us to give up a good shot for a great shot.”
“This was definitely Mason’s best game of his young career,” Taylor said. “He was balanced every time he shot the ball and took advantage of what the defense gave him. He played at an extremely high level tonight.”
Mike – who along with Mason transferred to JA from Dallas to live with his father, now the Jackson State men’s basketball coach – finished with 20 points, 14 in the second half. He also had 8 rebounds, 3 steals and 2 assists. Mike is rated as the No. 22 shooting guard in the country in the Class of 2025 by 247 Composite. Williams leads MAIS in scoring with a 20.0 average and is tied for first in Mississippi in 3-pointers made (58), according to MaxPreps going into Wednesday.
JA had 21 assists in 28 made shots, had 17 steals, and outrebounded the taller MRA 29-23. MRA started 6-foot-9 eighth-grader EJ Dampier and 6-6 junior Ashton Magee. JA’s tallest starter was 6-3 senior Fisher Waldrop.
“It was a team effort,” Taylor said. “We were trying to play too much of a finesse game against a team bigger than we were in the first half. We had a little meeting at halftime and told them the defense is going to get the offense going. We knew it was going to be a physical game. We need to go back to how the Raiders played at the beginning of the season. Make it 92 feet of we are in your grill. It was a pretty vocal meeting at halftime, and they responded. We knew (MRA senior point guard) Sam (Hailey) was a gifted ball handler and decision maker and we were hoping to make someone else be that (Hailey is MRA’s leading scorer for the season and had only 3 points with 6 assists). (JA senior guard) Caleb Gaitor did a great job. (JA junior guard) Schyler Chambers was everywhere in the second half. Mason making shots and Mike got going late. We (Taylor and assistant coach Andre Stringer) told Mike don’t force this, everyone knows you are a scorer. We’ve been working on this. We didn’t win overall tonight and if we had lost, we didn’t lose overall tonight. There is a lot of basketball left.”
MRA coach Richard Duease – the winningest basketball coach in Mississippi history and the second winningest active boys basketball coach in the country – has never had a team go undefeated and this was his best start in his 49 career seasons.
His best record was 35-3 in 2015-2016 season when MRA assistant coach Harper Hudnall was a senior and the Patriots won the Overall title.
Duease has won 1,825 games (1,233 boys and 592 girls) in his 49 seasons. He has won 41 state titles – No. 41 came last year when he won the MAIS Class 6A state championship – and has won 15 Overall Tournament titles (13 boys and two girls, all at MRA). Duease is in his 42nd season at MRA.
Duease – who will be inducted into Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame this summer – doesn’t get beat like this very often.
“(Mason and Mike Williams) are two great players,” Duease said. “We let the game get away from us. It can escalate very quickly when you play that type of team with full court pressure who makes shots like JA. We broke away from the team concept and it snowballed. It was a learning lesson for us. We’ve got to get ready Hartfield Friday (a conference game) and Raymond Saturday (in the Rumble in the South at Mississippi College in Clinton).”
MRA GIRLS 56, JA 35
Freshman point guard Anna Morgan Anderson scored a career-high 25 points to lead defending MAIS Class 6A and Overall Tournament champion MRA.
MRA improved to 24-2 overall and 3-0 in conference play. JA dropped to 12-11 overall and 2-1 in conference play and broke a seven-game winning streak.
Anderson made 10 of 13 shots from the field, 2 of 2 from 3-point range, and 3 of 3 from the free throw line.
MRA sophomore guard Presley Hughes and sophomore forward Annie Toler had 10 points each. Hughes made 4 of 6 shots from the field and 2 of 2 shots from the line with 7 assists, 4 rebounds, 2 blocked shots and 1 steal. Toler made 4 of 4 shots from the field and 2 of 2 shots from the line with 3 assists and 3 rebounds.
MRA – which was playing starter Allie Redding (out with an ankle injury) – shot a torrid 68.8 percent from the field (22 of 32). MRA had 16 assists.
MRA coach Stephen Force is only one of three active MAIS girls coaches with three or more Overall titles (JA’s Jan Sojourner has six and Pillow Academy’s Durwin Carpenter has four). Force won Overalls in 2007, 2015 and last season. He has 734 career wins in his 28 seasons, 592 wins in 22 seasons at MRA.
“This game was the best we had passed all year,” Force said. “Anna Morgan had a great shooting night, and her teammates made some key passes to help her. Anna Morgan is always moving and finds the right location. Everybody moved to the right spot and our execution was great. Presley did a great job guarding (JA sophomore guard Avery) Chambers and Annie did a great guarding (JA sophomore forward Gracelyn) Carmichael (JA’s top two scorers).”
JA rallied to tie MRA at 18-18 all with 3:15 to play in the second quarter, but MRA went on a 7-0 run to take a 25-18 lead at halftime. MRA outscored JA 21-9 to take a 46-27 lead after three quarters.
JA coach Jan Sojourner – the second winningest active girls basketball coach in Mississippi and third winningest all time – was disappointed in her team’s effort in the second half.
“I didn’t think we deserved to win,” said Sojourner has won 1,030games in 44 seasons, 39 at JA. She has won 928 games, a MAIS record six Overall Tournament championships and 10 state titles in her 39 years at JA.
“I didn’t think we played hard enough. I don’t mind telling the girls that, I don’t mind telling anybody that. They need to understand that you have to work through things, things aren’t going to be great all the time. They’ve got to be willing to work when things aren’t going great for them. Everybody can play hard. That’s a choice you have and to me we didn’t make a choice to play hard in the second half. We didn’t have any fight about us, and I’m really disappointed in that.”
Sophomore guard Ella King had 12 points and senior guard Harper Griffin 10 points for JA.
