The Copiah-Lincoln Community College men’s basketball team has some dudes.

In coaching parlance, dudes are the ones that can go out and get things done for you. Dudes know how to secure a rebound with two hands, how to crash the glass and how to play with the physicality that winning in the MACCC demands.

Monday in Wesson, the Wolves took on visiting Itawamba Community College in a meeting of two of the top teams in the league standings.

With ICC leading 27-25 midway through the first half, 6-foot-7 sophomore forward AJ Warnsley (Terry High) received a pass at the top of the key for CLCC.

Warnsley beat his defender to the left and drove down the middle of the lane.

Itawamba had another defender under the rim in 6-foot-8 freshman forward Eddie Page.

Page stepped up and made a half-hearted attempt to draw a charge that faded as he saw what Warnsley was capable of.

A third-year player for the Wolves who took an extra season of eligibility offered by COVID-19, Warnsley moved the ball over to his right hand, cock his arm back and threw down a monster slam that tied the game up and had the fans in Mullen Gymnasium screaming, “Dude!”

Fouled on the play, Warnsley sunk his subsequent free throw and it felt at that moment like Co-Lin had won the game before halftime ever started.

An 88-81 victory for Co-Lin was the eighth-straight win for second-year head coach David Sanders and moved his team to 15-5 overall with three more regular season games remaining.

Itawamba, who has former Brookhaven High and Co-Lin standout Darrian Wilson on the bench as a first-year assistant coach, dropped to 18-4 with the loss.

 

Co-Lin rotation stocked with experience

Sanders only plays six guys on most nights as the roster has shrunken over the course of the season due to injuries and attrition.

Those six that play all fit the bill of what four-year college coaches are looking for when it comes to the type of dudes they want to sign next.

That’s why the head coaches from Belhaven University, Tougaloo College and Mississippi College were in attendance on Monday along with assistants from Southeastern Louisiana University, William Carey University and others.

Warnsley is a third-year player for Co-Lin as is Brookhaven High product Jemario Hersey.

Guard Cowandric Samuel was a state champion in high school while playing at Callaway High in Jackson for Sanders. He’d already played a season at Jones College when Sanders got the job at Co-Lin back in 2021.

The 6-foot-3, 205-pound Samuel started in 13 games for Jones last season before transferring as a third-year player to reunite this season with Sanders at Co-Lin.

Warnsley is averaging 15.6 points and 7.8 rebounds per game and Samuel is chipping in 11.5 points, 5.8 rebounds and 5.8 assists per night. In addition to his big slam, Warnsley finished with 18 points and 10 rebounds while playing all 40 minutes in the win on Monday.

A big-bodied point guard that isn’t rattled by pressure, Samuel showed the toughness that sets older guys apart by diving for a loose ball that almost went for a Co-Lin turnover in the first half.

Samuel covered the distance of eight feet by leaping down onto the ball and calling a timeout despite the basketball hitting him in the stomach when he pounced on it. He stood up, shook off the blow and stayed in the game like nothing had happened — that’s a play only a dude makes.

Samuel finished with 16 points and 12 assists in the win.

CLCC has another Jones transfer in 6-foot-5, 220-pound sophomore forward Kaeden Laws. Laws has a smooth style to his game, and he operates best in the mid-range, a rarity in college basketball today.

Also, a state champion while playing at Center Hill High in Desoto County, Laws is averaging 11.3 points and 5.2 rebounds per game for CLCC during the 2022-2023 season. On Monday, he scored 20 points on 8-of-12 shooting from the floor.

The lone freshman in the six-man rotation for Co-Lin is Dylan Canoville, a 6-foot-6, 225-pound forward from Plantation, Florida.

Canoville scores 16.1 points per game and is shooting 50.2 percent from the floor while also grabbing 11.5 rebounds per game.

Against ICC, Canoville couldn’t be his usual aggressive self as he played most of the first half with two fouls and had four fouls for much of the late part of the game. He finished with 11 points and 12 rebounds in the win.

Three times this season Canoville has been picked as the MACCC Player of the Week.

When Sanders needs to go to the bench, he calls on sophomore point guard Andrew Anderson. Anderson is another older guy who appeared in 12 games as a freshman at the University of South Alabama during the 2020-2021 season.

Anderson has started in 12 games this season and is averaging 4.3 points and 4.1 assists per night.

 

Hersey has grown into a glue guy for CLCC

The Wolves were led in scoring by Hersey with 23 points against Itawamba.

Hersey is listed at 6-foot-3, but you’d swear he’s three inches taller thanks to his reach and the bounce that he possesses. Hersey seems to float in the air and on a team that has some talented dunkers, he’s one that’s always a play away from getting the crowd on its feet.

“I consider myself an exciting player to watch and I don’t want that to sound like I’m bragging or anything,” said Hersey after the win over ICC. “I just try to stay around the rim on both ends and make things happen for my team.”

Monday he went 9-of-14 from the floor, 2-of-5 from the 3-point line and 3-of-3 from the free throw line. He grabbed eight rebounds and blocked two shots while playing 34 minutes.

Sanders inherited both Warnsley and Hersey from former Co-Lin head coach Kenny Bizot. Both played last season with Hersey averaging 7.8 points per game and Warnsley scoring 11.8 points per night for a CLCC team that finished 6-17 in 2021-2022.

Sanders and his assistant coach Reggie Chambers gave releases to every player on that team after the season concluded.

That included guard Trey Fort, who scored 26.3 points per game last season for Co-Lin. Fort signed to play at Howard College in Big Spring, Texas. He’s currently averaging 23 points per game and has signed to play next season at Mississippi State.

The CLCC coaching staff felt like a total reset was needed for the sake of chemistry though, but after hunting for new players, they felt like Warnsley and Hersey were worth bringing back for a third year.

“We actually made the decision to release AJ and Jemario last year after they’d played as sophomores for us,” said Sanders. “We went looking for more guys and realized that they were two people that could really help us, but we needed to just put more work in to help them get better. We brought them back and they’ve both had great attitudes all season.”

The growth of Hersey has been just as much about the mental side of the game as it’s been about the physical. He started making his bones as a high-flyer on the court for Brookhaven High as a junior, but there were times that a call by a ref or something said by one his teammates could knock him off his game.

“Mario handles the mental ups and downs of the game so much better this season,” said Sanders. “He doesn’t really get down on himself like he would in the past. Even when he makes a mistake, he’s giving it his all. He’s been huge for us all season. I tell our point guards, just throw it up around the rim and he’ll go get it.”

Talk with Hersey and the maturity of being a third-year player shines through even more.

“Being out here on this court, it’s not high school basketball anymore, it’s tough and it’s physical,” said Hersey. “I know the opportunities I can get through playing ball are bigger than me and that’s a huge part of my growth. There are people that wish they had this opportunity to play college basketball and I can’t take anything for granted.”

 

Wolves hoping for a strong finish to the regular season

Co-Lin has three regular season games remaining. They’ll play at Meridian on Thursday and will then host Mississippi Gulf Coast on Tuesday, Feb. 21. The regular season wraps up with a trip to Senatobia on Thursday, Feb. 23 to play at Northwest Mississippi CC.

The MACCC has done away with the state tournament phase of the postseason and teams will now go right into NJCAA Region 23 Tournament play. The first four teams in the postseason seeding will get a first round bye and will then host a quarterfinal game after the next eight teams in the standings get paired down to four.

Currently, Co-Lin has a league record of 9-2 (one of those losses came in triple OT to Holmes and the other at East Mississippi). ICC and East Mississippi are tied for second place with 8-3 records. Pearl River is 8-4 and Meridian, coached by former Southern Miss head coach James Green, is 7-3.

Sanders has a group of dudes and these dudes trust each other and trust their coach. That’s a big part of building the win streak they’re currently on.

“I think we had 10 turnovers tonight against Itawamba,” said Sanders. “We had eight turnovers in our last game and eight in the game before that. Taking care of the basketball has been huge for us. We’ve got five guys averaging in double figures and this group honestly doesn’t care who gets the most credit or who scores the most points.”

Play hard, play together, play for each other — that’s the kind of dudes everyone wants to coach.

Cliff Furr is the sports editor at The Daily Leader. He can be reached via email at sports@dailyleader.com.