With the 2017 athletics calendar upon us, there is much to celebrate in the past year’s accomplishments across the Miss-Lou.

From a slew of title contenders to a number of state champions, the Miss-Lou represented itself on the biggest of stages.

Here is a look at some of the top sports stories from 2016:

Natchez High duo claims boys, girls long jump titles

Ernesha Chatman was attempting to repeat as the MHSAA Class 5A long jump champion, while Freddie Singleton looked to capture the boy’s long jump title after falling short the previous three seasons.

Mission accomplished for both.

Chatman leapt 18-00.25 to win the girls, and Singleton leapt 22-7.50 to claim the boys title.

The gold medals capped off a banner year for both athletes as they each helped their respective boys and girls squads win South State titles for the third consecutive year.

Trinity boys, girls tennis claim MAIS titles

Spearheaded by the duo of Cole Mosby and Grant Falkenheiner, the Trinity boys claimed the MAISAA state title

Mosby and Falkenheiner each won the boys No. 1 and No. 2 tennis singles on their way to helping the Saints achieve the high honor.

On the girl’s side, No. 2 doubles state champion winners Hannah Fitt and McKenzie Smith helped the Lady Saints to a second-place finish in state.

Cathedral relay team brings school first MAIS title

Green Wave runners Weston Diamond, Nic Waycaster, Jaylen McCoy and Austin Gibson claimed combined to run an 8:54.42 in the 4×800 meter-dash relay to give Cathedral it’s first state title since making the transition to MAIS.

Cathedral cross-country coach Tommy Smith said the quartet knocked nearly 10 seconds off previous runs to win the event by approximately three seconds.

Injuries not enough to hold back Cathedral tennis duo

Despite playing her entire 2016 season with a knee injury, Marty Lewis in conjunction with Emma Hogue, won the girl’s No. 2 doubles MAIS AAA state championship.

The Cathedral tandem won its state championship match in three sets, 7-5, 5-7, and 7-5, defeating catholic school rival St. Aloysius.

The Green Wave pair came back from a 5-2 deficit in the first set before outlasting the St. Aloysius duo.

Cathedral boys win cross-country title

Cathedral cross-country coach Tommy Smith had a hint that his boys squad was on the precipice of something great.

Smith’s intuition proved to be true.

Cathedral tallied 42 points and outlasted rivals Columbia Academy and St. Aloysius to earn the MAIS AAA state championship.

The win was extra sweet for the Green Wave as they fell just short to Kirk Academy last season, losing 63 points to 67.

ACCS falls short in football title game

Adams County Christian School ripped off 11 straight wins but came just one victory short of bringing its first title home since 1982 after falling to Indianola Academy.

The Rebels paired a strong rushing attack with a stingy defense to earn their way to the championship game appearance.

Thanks to their outstanding efforts, six ACCS standouts earned their way to The Natchez Democrat’s First-Team All-Metro squad.

Cathedral earns way to championship game

Led by a special crop of seniors, Cathedral fell one win shy of winning back-to-back state championships.

The Green Wave fell to Silliman Institute in a best of three series for the MAIS title this past May.

Cathedral won the first game of the series, 4-2, but lost the following two games at Silliman, 5-2 and 12-1.

Cathedral won 18 of its final 20 games, with the two losses coming in the same day to Silliman

Alcorn falls short of 3-peat

Leading 17-0 over rival Grambling State in the SWAC championship game, Alcorn State was one half away from securing its third consecutive conference crown.

Grambling, however, scored 27 of the next 30 points to top Alcorn 27-20.

The Braves fell just short of a repeat appearance in the Celebration Bowl with the loss.

Alcorn finished the season 5-6 with a 5-4 mark in conference play.