Viking alums get win

Published 12:22 am Sunday, July 29, 2012

LAUREN WOOD | THE NATCHEZ DEMOCRAT \ Natchez High School alumnus Jeremy McMorris goes up for a shot against Vidalia High School alumnus Ronald Ellis during the Natchez vs. Vidalia alumni game SaturdaLAUREN WOOD | THE NATCHEZ DEMOCRAT Natchez High School alumnus Jeremy McMorris goes up for a shot against Vidalia High School alumnus Ronald Ellis during the Natchez vs. Vidalia alumni game Saturday night at Vidalia Junior High School. Vidalia defeated Natchez, 100-87.y night at Vidalia Junior High School. Vidalia defeated Natchez, 100-87.

VIDALIA — A three-headed monster led the Vidalia High School Alumni Basketball team to a victory over the Natchez High School Alumni team Saturday night at the Vidalia Junior High School.

Jesse Banks scored 24 points, Ronald Ellis netted 20 and Gary Stewart added 19 to lead the former Vikings to a 100-87 win.

“It was pretty nice (to win),” Stewart said. “It’s mostly bragging rights, but it’s all friendly.”

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Natchez’s leading scorer, Jeremy McMorris, finished the game with 26 points. McMorris said the game was something that the two teams came up with last week.

“I just love playing with these guys, and I love playing the game,” he said.

Stewart said it was good to take their pick-up games to a local gymnasium in front of fans of both schools.

“We wanted to do something for the community,” he said. “We wanted to play before everybody started to go back to school.”

Banks said it was special for him to get to play in front of the hometown crowd again.

“We play every day, but we wanted to do something else, and we don’t get to play in front of people,” Banks said.

Banks netted six three-pointers in the game to help lead Vidalia to the win. Vidalia hit 10 threes in the game.

Vidalia led 41-36 at halftime and led by just six points with under six minutes to go before going on a run to end the game.

Former Viking standout Torrey Dixon finished the game with 12 points. Jarvis Vaughn and D.J. Polk each added nine points.

Trevon Chatman was Natchez’s second-leading scorer with 15 points. Demetric Dent added 14 points and Javon Washington scored 11 points.