Jacket buzzSTARKVILLE HIGH SCHOOL

VOLUME XVI, No. 1 • 11-20-08

By Tess Long

Contributing Writer

Soon actors will be doing final make-up and prop checks and mothers will be running around like crazy making last minute costume adjustments. Fall is here, and it is time for Starkville High School’s annual festival theatre production.

This year SHS will be performing The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and putting it’s own personal twist on the classic tale of quiet villagers, jealous lovers, and supernatural beings written by Washington Irving in 1917.

“I wanted something darker, but still appropriate for school,” SHS drama director Mandy Kinney said.

This year’s performance is certainly darker than those of previous years, such as last years’ comedy, You Can’t Take It With You. However, many of the same actors and actresses from lighter SHS productions are taking on the challenge of the darker piece.

“Well, it’s a dark play.” sophomore Hal Sullivan, who will be playing the role of Brom Bones in the production, said. “It’s definitely a different mindset for SHS.”

“It’s challenging, being my first year, to jump into something that takes such focus and such a mindset as acting in such a macabre, dark piece,” Sullivan said.

It definitely is much darker than the actors at SHS are used to, but they’re determined to make it a show to re-member with a little help from their student directors, Nathan Hare and Tillery Tomlinson.

“I hope the student body is as pumped as we are,” Hare said. “We’re very ex-cited to be creating our first original play and entering it into competition. We’ve made great progress thus far and look forward to opening night.”

Hare is a senior and has appeared in SHS plays such as You Can’t Take It With You, and Beauty and The Beast.

However, away from the hustle and

bustle of the theater, few students at SHS know what Festival is all about.

To most, it is simply another spec-tacular performance put on once again by the talented actors and actresses of SHS. But to the drama department, Festival goes far beyond the SHS The-ater.

Festival is a highly competitive theat-rical competition.

The first phase of the competition begins at Mississippi State University and hosts schools from all over the northern half of the state.

Each play must be under 45 minutes, and all props and set pieces must be within a marked ten foot square when the caller signals the start of the play.

Each performance is critiqued by judges, and five schools are selected to go on to the statewide competition, held this year in Natchez, Miss.

The theatre department will host a public performance in the SHS The-ater Tuesday, Dec. 2 before entering competition at MSU on Dec. 5-6.

Danielle Grimes, Claudia Bennett, Collin Whitten, Mariel Marcum, and Davis Richardson rehearse for the play.

Festival reimagines Sleepy Hollow

Codes,

menu

change in

SHS cafeBy Whitney Peterson

Staff Writer

Students who eat lunch at the Yellow Jacket Cafe have noticed some changes lately.

Cafeteria lines have been even longer than usual this fall because of new student lunch codes and menu items have been changed to make the food healthier.

Beverly Lowery, the Child Nutrition Director for the Starkville School District, said the change in num-bers was brought on by the concerns of parents who wished to protect their chil-drenís social security num-bers.

“Many parents were con-cerned about identity fraud,” she said.

Lowery’s department is in charge of nutrition for the entire school district. Many students and faculty have noticed the change in the lunch menu, including the extinction of the grilled cheese sandwich. “We want you guys to be healthy,” Lowery said.

In a world where conve-nience is combated with identity theft, government regulations and healthy meets nasty, Starkville High School’s Yellowjacket Cafe’ is lost in the mix.

SHS Jacket BuzzNews

OnSunday,Sept.15,juniorBrendaLiuspraypaintedmessages(above)onthewallsoftheschoolbeforeboardingtoAustraliathefollowingMonday.

SHS DEFACEDBy Lammi Micha

Staff Writer

Is it the message, or is it the act?

This is the question that was eating at Starkville High School principal Kathi Wil-son after an act of vandal-ism with a pseudo-positive message appeared on some of the school’s exterior walls..

Upon their return to school on Monday, Sep-tember 15, 2008, students were greeted by graffiti all over the breeze-way and carpool lane.

The artwork was done by SHS junior Brenda Liu, who moved with her fam-ily to Australia immediately after the act and wanted to

“go out with a bang” ac-cording to her Facebook page.

Wilson, along with the as-sisstant principals, refused to confirm any accusations that it was Liu who did the artwork because of the stu-dent’s right to privacy.

Liu, however, did confirm to the Jacket Buzz that she was the “artist” who spray painted comments along the walls.

“Well, I figured I would never get another chance like this again, so why not?” Liu said. “And this is a se-cret, but, I’m deathly afraid of being forgotten, which is why I do all of this crazy stuff.”

One wall said “I am, we are,” while another said

“Throw off your lacquered mannequin shells, and defy, defy, defy!”

Another wall had a qiant image of the word, “Love,” with the letter “L” in the shape of a heart surround-ing the rest of the word.

On the sidewalk about ten yards away was another message that said “Dear concrete, stay strong.”

Besides the fact that the action of “tagging” is ille-gal, Wilson and Assistant Principal Debbie Thomas seemed to take it quite per-sonally.

“It is disrespectful to the district, the school, the stu-dents here, and to the in-stitution of truth and hon-esty,” said Wilson.

Thomas said that SHS has

“come a long way,” and the graffiti has “dampened” the students’ moods.

Thomas also finds it de-grading that there is a stu-dent that would disrespect Starkville High School in such a manor, and thinks that suitable punishment should follow.

“Although the students may think it’s funny,” said Assistant Principal Sean McDonald, “it costs a lot of money to fix.”

According to janitor Jes-sie Calmes, it took mark remover, some red solu-tion, comet, and a pressure washer from maintenance to remove all of the spray paint.

“It took us about six whole hours to scrub it all

off,” said Janitor Geneva Austin.

The graffiti has been greeted with mixed reviews from the student body.

“I thought it was very bold and unique in its own way,” freshman Addison Watson said. “I just think that Brenda wanted to make a big deal out of her leaving Starkville High.”

Other SHS students were not as supportive of Liu, though.

“Even though what was said could have been worse than what could have been written or drawn, it’s still wrong,” senior Paige Wat-son said. “Brenda got lucky, and I wouldn’t advise any-one else to try to follow in her footsteps.”

SHS Jacket Buzz News

For Sale! 1993 Mazda truck. Very good condition. Runs great. $2,600. If interested please call Karen Linford at 323-4974 after 5:00pm.

Band performs

classic rock setBy Zach Mitchell

Editor-in-Chief

As one walks into a half-time show at a SHS foot-ball home game, it would appear as though the entire stadium is tuned into the same classic rock station.

A medley of Queen’s “We Are the Champions”, “Fat Bottomed Girls”, and “An-other One Bites the Dust”, as well as Van Morrison’s “Moondance” and The Who’s “Pinball Wizard” resonate in the air.

This year’s theme is classic rock and the SHS marching band is giving it all they’ve got.

Band director Mr. Sullivan says that the songs were chose purely on “what the audience would like.” Ob-viously, the audience and critics love it.

The band won a WCBI sponsored “Battle of the Bands” competition and received straight supe-rior ratings at Aberdeen’s and the Mississippi High School Activities Associa-tion’s band competitions.

The students in the band have been putting in many hours a day starting in July.

“The kids work really hard and enjoy the music a lot,” Sullivan said. “It’s only my

second year teaching here, so the kids are starting to get used to me.”

Freshman French horn player Rebecca Griffith says that, “The songs this year are definitely chal-lenging and are very fun to play.”

Sophomore quints play-er josh Stone agrees with Griffith, also adding that the songs are “more fun than last year’s songs.”

Sullivan says the only complaint he has is that the band goes unnoticed and is overshadowed by other school activities.

“But that’s starting to change,” he said. “The kids are very hardwork-ing and anyone could’ve pushed then in the right di-rection. I think people are finally starting to see that these kids work extremely hard.”

For the future, Sullivan hopes that “the band just has fun.”

“It’s all about putting on a good show,” he adds. He also hopes that they will be a superior band for years to come.

Look for the band in the State Concert Festival this spring, where they hope to continue their streak of su-perior ratings.

New teachers begin SHS careersBy Kienan Grice

Staff Writer

Give a friendly welcome to our new teachers of Starkville High School!

Mimi Atkins and Denise Taylor are new teaches ing the math department.

“Not only is it a dream come true, but it’s a positive experience that I’ll never

be a able to forget,” Atkins said.

Ms. Clay teaches science.Floreine Sawyer teaches

Social Studies. Lula Owens teaches read-

ing. Marilyn Tillery teaches-

family/individual health and child development.

Mindy Johnson teaches special education. Mary

Windrick, Ella Jefferson, and Mary Adams teaching special education.

Cicely Smith and Christie Spears are teaching English.

Atkins says, “Not only is it a dream come true, but it’s a positive experience that I’ll never be a able to forget.”

Stop by some time and give any of these teachers a warm welcome to SHS!

NewSHSteacherDeniseTaylordiscussesalessonwithherhighschoolmathclass.

Chorus gearing up for holidays

By Whitney Peterson

Staff Writer

The Starkville High School Choir entered the year with a tremendous start.

Director Regina Weeks has a lot planned for the adolescents.

During the Veteran’s Day program, the choir showed their patriotism in an event worthy of commence-ment.

Recently, eight students were able to attend the Uni-versity of Southern Miss Choral Conference.

They held a concert on September 30.

Right now, Weeks plans for the choir’s annual Christmas concert.

“We encourage all faculty and students to come out and enjoy a night of holiday fun,” Weeks said. “Some classes give extra credit if they go to the program and bring a program back.”

The Christmas concert consists of holiday classics, new, more contemporary pieces, and a grand finale of pop music. Admission is $5 for adults and $3 for students.

Later in the year, the group plans for the biannu-al Madrigal Dinner, district and state choral competi-

tion, a trip to Disney World during Spring Break, and the annual Spring Concert.

“Mrs. Weeks challenges us and akes our singing ability to new heights,” says soprano Hannah Reynolds.

The choir has obtained all superior ratings consis-tently for eight years under Weeks.

In 2007, many choral stu-dents attended New York’s boasted Carnegie Hall and received an invitation to at-tend this year.

Sarah Melohn, Mrs. Weeks’s current student teacher, boasts, “They’re gonna be great. They sound really good.”

SHS Jacket BuzzOpinion

By Ruth Brown

Staff Writer

Most of the students at SHS are in at least one club.

The school offers a long list of organizations to choose from, however, this list varies little in the types of clubs it offers.

I have the opinion that the students of Starkville High are missing out on a valu-able part of the high school experience.

Most of the clubs they are being offered are service clubs and causes. Service groups like Key Club and Leo Club are practically the same thing.

While these organizations are good to be involved in, I find that the students would benefit more from a well-balanced system of clubs.

To get to the point, what this school is lacking are good interest clubs.

Interest clubs are groups where students can go to do what they like to do best.

Clubs like this do not de-mand anymore from the members than their general enthusiasm. They can also be a great way for people of the same mind set to meet and become friends.

Interest clubs encourage students to pursue their in-terests and dreams as well as become a part of the school.

Aside from all of this, I realize that SHS has made a few good efforts in this area.

Clubs like Film Club and

Writer’s Strike have already managed to accomplish a lot.

They serve as examples of the possibilities for oth-er interest clubs to come. Sophomore Mariel Mar-cum has contributed her thoughts to this problem.

Marcum states, “I believe that students can stand up and do something for them-selves and their interests. I like the idea and I think it’s a good thing.”

Mariel agrees with me on this matter and I think that most of the students will as well. However, not every-one feels this way.

Senior Brock Hanson has shared his thoughts as well. Hanson says, “We need to be communist! No clubs! No freedom!”

Brock represents an ex-treme opposing opinion to my own. I’m sure, however, that he will not have much support.

I believe that the students deserve more than what they are getting.

However, the teachers and administration are not like-ly to give much unless the students are willing to meet them more than halfway.

Most clubs are run pri-marily by students, with the teachers there merely as adult supervision.

The point is, it is going to be mostly up to the students to do something about Starkville High’s disturbing lack of interest clubs.

Like Marcum stated ear-lier, students can and hope-fully will stand up for what they want.

SHS needs

interest clubs

Career/Tech-Ed class needs work

By Zach Mitchell

Editor-in-Chief

Many sophomores’ cries as they picked up their schedules were the same:

“I didn’t sign up for this!”

“What’s this career class?” “How many teachers teach this?”

It was through their schedule of courses for the upcoming year that every sophomore became aware of a new program called “Career/ Technical Ed.”

For those freshmen, ju-niors, and seniors who don’t know what this class is, it’s a combination of four different Vocational Technology (or VoTech) classes that are four and a half weeks long each.

Students were able to choose them at the end of last year, but were unaware of exactly why they had to choose the four that looked

the most interesting.As a sophomore, I’m re-

quired to take this class (or classes, whichever one the reader would like to think) and I believe that it is a waste of a block in my schedule.

Coming into my sopho-more year, I had hoped to knock out a foreign lan-guage or shape up my de-bating skills in a class.

That is not the case.The point of most Vo-

Tech classes is to help stu-dents who aren’t going to a four-year college find an-other career path.

I already know what ca-reer I’d like to have and need to stick with that path throughout high school.

Sophomore is the first year of high school where one begins to have quite a bit of freedom over one’s schedule, and making an-other class required can take away that freedom.

The whole system seems to be set up poorly.

Teachers complain that this was sprung on them at the last minute and that they had no clue what to expect.

These same teachers com-plain that they were only told that they’d have to edit down their class into a bite-sized four-and-a-half week chunk, that the first time was to be a learning experience for the teacher as well as the students.

The students that have a class during their second rotation will experience a better lesson plan then the first rotation will.

This will continue on and on until the fourth rota-tion, where those students will get the best education from that class as they can.

Likewise, students are complaining about getting courses they didn’t even choose.

However, the counselor at Millsaps assured the students that before their second rotation, they ac-tually chose the next class that they were going into.

Supposedly, the point of this class is to encourage students to take a VoTech class in their junior year.

If anything, this class has discouraged me from do-ing so.

I’ve even had half of a nine-week period of mate-rial pumped into me. I’d be bored silly whenever that lesson was taught.

I’ll be even further be-hind on my list of classes I wish to take if I choose to take a VoTech class. This class needs a serious re-form.

The Jacket Buzz

This newspaper is produced by the

Journalism Department at Starkville High School.

Zach Mitchell, Editor-in-Chief

Volume 16, Issue 1

R.J. Morgan, Advisor

Please email any comments, questions,

or concerns to rjmorgan@starkville.k12.ms.us

Staff Writers Lammi Micha, Ruth Brown, Kienan Grice, Whitney

Peterson, Jocelyn Williams, Heather Stevens

Contributing Writers Tess Long, Ebony Robinson, Sarah Morse

SHS Jacket Buzz Opinion

Election season over, democrats win bigBy Heather Stevens

Staff Writer

So, the election is finally over. Well, almost.... (per-mission to roll your eyes).

In this presidential elec-tion, there were not many surprises. Red states were red; blue states were blue.

Personally, I’m still sigh-ing in relief because I didn’t once hear the haunting phrase “hanging chad.”

This year did, however, did yield the highest-ever voter turnout.

I suppose it’s safe to say that because of the high attendance at the polls, de-mocracy was at its best this year.

Because more people vot-ed in this election, the pres-ident-elect truly became a

“candidate for the people.” Why did so many people

wait in line just to push a button?

My best guesses are the publicity and tension be-tween the two candidates and their respective parties, and the majority of the second-largest population demographic in the United States is now registered to vote in greater numbers.

If people felt that it would be a close race to be deter-mined by a few percent-ages, then they were prob-ably pressured to make sure they cast their vote for their candidate of choice.

People like to believe that their vote truly did make a difference, regardless of the hoards and multitudes of others who like to be-

lieve the very same thing. Another main reason

for higher voter turnout is you; the youth, the young people, the 15-25 year-olds who, many for the first time in a presidential elec-tion, wanted to make their choice known and have an impact on national politics.

As foreshadowed by the results of our own mock election, the majority of young voters voted for Ba-rack Obama.

Another thing that aided Obama on his journey to the White House was his distance from the Bush ad-ministration.

While he may have started with the best ideas and in-tentions, the reality of the matter is that the vast ma-jority of Americans are ex-

hausted and frustrated with the results of the past eight years.

Abstaining from person-al judgment here, it is by my observations that even some of the staunchest re-publicans I know have spo-ken out against the current administration.

Good, bad, or indifferent, Obama was able to truth-fully deny any affiliation with Bush’s presidency.

Many political analysts believe that McCain’s as-sociation and similar voting record with George Bush is one of the main injuries done to the McCain cam-paign.

Although McCain and Pa-lin did all they could to con-vince the American people that they would “point

America in a new direc-tion,” it just didn’t fly with the majority of voters.

Many asked themselves the same question I asked, “How can you be inter-ested in a ‘new direction’ when you’re the conserva-tive candidate?

Conservative means that you conserve the tradition-al past values, which means you aren’t so different from George Bush.”

Oh well, it’s not like it matters too much now any-way.

I’m stoked about the up-coming historical presiden-cy, and I hope you are too.

If for no other reason than signaling growth and social progress, the next four years are sure to make history.

By Kienan Grice

Staff Writer

Fourth lunch has been a problem since it was intro-duced last year.

A few of the problems with fourth lunch are that students run out of food, it is quite crowded, and most importantly, there is not enough time for students to eat.

To begin with, the last lunch of the day has always had a problem with running out of the food necessary to feed all the students.

On days such as chicken tender day and loaded baked potato day the cafeteria often runs out of the main course and has to resort to burgers and sandwiches.

Then on some days it even

runs out of those items. On these same days, the

last people in line are usually late for class.

“It’s a completely flawed system when you don’t have enough time to eat,” said sophomore Samaria Outlaw.

Most other students that I’ve spoken to agree.

The issue of lunch being crowded was supposed to be solved with the splitting of the lunches, but it didn’t quite work.

Now we have two lunches reasonably filled one all the way and one with room to spare.

The organization of the lunches is by hallways, and during third block there are either an uneven number of teachers that have the block off in some of the hallways

or there are more students in certain classes than in others, making some lunches have more students than others.

This problem could be eas-ily solved by giving some classes a different lunch.

The last major problem with the lunches is students getting out of lunch late.

When we have days that the students enjoy whatever meal is being served, more people get in line to eat and more people order extras.

When this happens it takes longer because more food much be cooked in order to feed all the students.

This becomes a problem because when the bell rings a student still has food, they stay until they are finished which results in class time being cut into.

Fourth lunch has crowd problemsPolitical Cartoon

By Sarah Morse

~

By Lammi Micha

Staff Writer

“Deface Me,” “Cabin Pressure,” “In the Ground,” “Euphoria,” and “Sophie is a Vampire.”

These are the songs on the Jarheads’ new EP en-titled No Sugar.

According to the band, which is comprised entirely of Starkville High School students, the album is com-plete and all that is left to do before its release is some “legal stuff.”

“Technically, we could sell the CDs now,” guitarist and vocalist Grant Beatty said. “But we are just try-ing to get 500-1,000 copies pressed to prevent us from having to burn a copy every time someone wants one.,”

Beatty, along with drum-mer Collin Whitten and bassist Adrian Lewis, have been playing together for about two and a half years and have composed many songs together.

The band has played at several school events, most recently at a concert for the Invisible Children club.

All three are juniors at SHS.

“Each show is a new ex-perience, but I’m playing my show, take it or leave it,” Beatty said,

“We’re not going to give you any watered down Panic at the Disco,” they all agreed, “we’re going to give you real music all the time.”

No Sugar only contains

five songs but still manag-es to capture the Jarheads’ sound and style.

“There is a major differ-ence between a full length album and five songs,” Whitten said. “On a full length album, you have room for filler songs, where on a five-song album there is room for the best songs and nothing less.”

The cover for the album, is, well, unique.

“We just wanted to do something edgy,” Lewis said.

Lewis is responsible for finding Finas Townsend, the cover artist for No Sug-ar.

Townsend is a fourth year architecture student at Mississippi State and takes a class taught by Adrian’s mother.

“We gave him a copy of the album, told him to listen to it, and just draw,” said Whitten. “He just went with it, and we are very happy with what we got.”

When the new album is released, Beatty says ev-eryone at Starkville High School has an open invi-tation to the CD release party.

SHS Jacket BuzzEntertainment

GrantBeatty,AdrianLewis,andCollinWhittenrocktheInvisibleChildrenConcert.

By Zach Mitchell

Editor-in-Chief

The opening lines of “De-face Me,” (Watching you come around/it always seems to bring me down) on The Jarheads’ new EP No Sugar state the central theme quite plainly. The entire album is an exercise in being put down, girls, and vampires. Yet, The Jarheads make the tried and true concepts ring with new sound with their mix of ska and punk.

Known for their energetic live shows where singer and guitarist Grant Beatty is prone to throwing himself around the stage, The Jarheads have gathered quite a following in Starkville and the surround-ing area. Bassist Adrian Lewis plays fluent ska bass lines that provide a strong counterpoint to drummer Collin Whitten’s almost spas-tic, flailing-arms approach to drumming similar of that to

Keith Moon of The Who’s. Beatty’s punk chords occa-sionally delve into pure rock notes and almost-solos that are almost as catchy as the lyrics themselves.

The disc really picks up with the emotional “Cabin Pressure,” in which Beatty compares a relationship to a plane crash and begging for her to crash into him. The album hits a low with the ge-neric “In the Ground,” which seems to just be filler (oddly enough for a five-track EP), with Beatty asking a girl to stay with him and how he’ll “Take her out on the town again.” “In the Ground” draws from Young Agent Jones’s bag-of-generic-tricks, down to the tambourine and the root-note bass.

“Euphoria”, the de facto Jarheads anthem, does not disappoint. The live show is translated perfectly into this song, with Whitten’s drums melding with Lewis’s fleet-

fingered bass. Beatty’s sparse punk delivery sets this song apart as he explains himself to the one he’s done wrong.

The production on No Sugar is brilliant, especially on “Cabin Pressure”, where Beatty’s voice echoes of into the emptiness that surrounds him and his guitar harmon-ics fade into each other. It even makes “In the Ground” listenable, transforming the verses into the great singa-long that fans hope for.

“Sophie is a Vampire,” al-most seems like a metaphor for a relationship, but it’s just really a song about a vam-pire girlfriend. Take it as a joke and you’ll miss out on the real reason it was written: pure punk. That goes for the whole album. No Sugar is a fun punk album that is a sign of even more greatness to come out of this young band.

4/5 Stars

Jarheads’ No Sugar is sweetnessHigh schoolers’ band

record first album

Jarheads CD as frantic as live show

SHS Jacket Buzz Sports

By Ebony Robinson

Contributing Writer

While other students are going home after a long day of school, Chuck Tillery’s day has just begun. Wheth-er it’s running a mile or lift-ing weights, Tillery still has many tasks ahead of him.

Tillery plays starting wide receiver for the Yellow Jack-ets football team in the fall, and then patrols left field for the SHS baseball team in the spring.

Since the age of five, Til-lery has been chasing after his dream of playing both baseball and football at the University of Southern Cal-ifornia.

“He’s good at what he does,” football player Trev-ell Robinson said. “He’s one of those guys you can trust in a last minute game win-ning situation.”

Things weren’t always easy for Tillery. He often strug-gles with staying healthy and maintaining strength.

“There are times when I want to quit because I feel I can’t do it.” said Tillery. “Practicing everyday after school and during my spare time gives me back my con-fidence.”

While growing up, main-taining sports and a social life was hard on Tillery.

“When I was young, play-ing sports was hard because I couldn’t do what I really wanted to do,” Tillery said. “My parents wanted me to focus on school work more than sports. I just wanted to do my own thing.”

Now that he is in high school, playing varsity sports only adds to his popularity with the student body. But it’s his determination and effort towards sports that makes him stand out to his coaches.

“Chuck is really easy to coach,” wide receiver’s Coach Thompson said. “He’s a smart player and works hard. He’s really a coach’s dream.”

Tillery valuable as

two-sport athlete

JuniorChuckTilleryplaysfootballandbaseballforSHS.

Carter’s boys off to quick start

Football team finishes 2008 season with win

By Lammi Micha

Staff Writer

The Starkville High School Yellow Jacket football team finished their season at home on Nov. 7 with a 29-21 victory over Colum-bus.

It was a result Yellow Jacket fans had wait-ed all season to see.

SHS finished with a 3-8 record and missed the playoffs for only the second time in 14 years and only the fifth time in the last 28 years. It is Starkville’s first losing season since 1988.

“It’s not the start of the race, it’s the fin-ish,” head coach Bill Lee said. “I’m proud of the way the guys fought all year long. They showed how strong they are and will be in life and their decision making.”

The Yellow Jackets’ other wins this season came on Sept. 26 at Desoto Central and on Oct. 10 at Horn Lake.

“I am just really proud that no one gave in, and played hard and just really took care of their game.” senior Sherrod Robinson said. “The other players motivated me to keep on going, and the coaches pushed me too.”

SHS played one of the toughest schedules in the state. Seven of the Jackets’ eleven

opponents were ranked among the top ten teams in the state in most preseason polls, including two teams, South Panola and Wayne County, that are still undefeated and a Meridian team that has only one loss.

Even with the tough schedule, SHS was in the playoff hunt right up to the last min-utes of the 2008 season, and in retrospect, only a midseason 20-14 loss to Southaven left the Jackets on the outside of the playoff bracket looking in.

“Although the results of some of the games were disappointing, we never quit,” senior William Arick said. “We fought until the last quarter of the last game.”

The way sophomore Jarrod Atterberry sees it, this season was just a “work in prog-ress” for the upcoming next year.

“I have positively no regrets for this sea-son,” Atterberry said. “It will just make me stronger for next year. I can study what I did wrong this season and improve.”

Lee remains positive about the direction of the program, even if their record doesn’t show it.

“The easiest thing to do is quit, and I’m proud of the fact that they didn’t, “said Lee. “They seem to really believe in one Jacket, one sting.”

By Ruth Brown

Staff Writer

The Starkville High School boy’s basketball team has started out their season with a 3-1 record.

The Yellow Jackets earned their third win last Saturday against Kosciusko, beating the Whippets 77-37.

“We played pretty well,” head coach Greg Carter said. “We still haven’t been able to play well for an en-tire game and turn around and do it again for another game.”

SHS also defeated New-ton 76-46 on Nov. 8.

Junior Rashad Perkins was the leading scorer with 19 points.

Other players with dou-ble-digit scoring totals were Bryce Brown with 14, Edward Fumo with 13, and James Evans with 12.

“We play well together,” Perkins said. “We know how each other play. We just still need more ball movement.”

The Newton victory was a quick change of pace for SHS after losing its first

home game of the season to Meridian 60-55 on Nov. 4.

Perkins had 18 points in the loss, but could not outpace Meridian’s Rodney Hood, who finished the game with 22 points.

“We didn’t defend or re-bound very well,” Carter said. “But this team is still a good team with a lot of games left in them.”

The Yellow Jackets’ next chance to improve their record will be tonight at home against the Green-ville Hornets.

Sports Buzz

The Sting

Of Defeat

11.20.08

The 3-8 Yellowjacket football team missed

the MHSAA Playoffs for only the second

time in 14 years.

Read reactions from players and head

coach Bill Lee inside on page 7.