Morningside Loses Big to Tennessee School; National Rank Periled

After years of dominating girls basketball, Morningside High finally met its match Thursday night.

And it wasn’t pretty.

Cannon County High of Tennessee dominated every phase of the game en route to a 72-43 victory over the Lady Monarchs in the semifinals of the Best of the U.S. Invitational tournament at Shelbyville, Tenn.

The defending Tennessee Class 2-A champions opened a 19-6 lead and had the game well in hand by halftime, 40-15. Cannon County (13-1) will meet defending mythical national champion Shelbyville (9-0) in tonight’s title game.

Morningside (9-2), suffering its second loss in a week, made only 16 of 56 shots from the floor (28%) and was seven of 29 (24%) in the first half.

It was an especially rough night for Lisa Leslie, Morningside’s 6-foot-5 All-American center. She made just four of 20 field goal attempts and turned the ball over seven times. Still, Leslie led the Lady Monarchs with 14 points and 14 rebounds.

The loss figures to take its toll on Morningside’s national ranking. The Lady Monarchs entered the season rated No. 1 by USA Today but fell to No. 6 after losing to Brea-Olinda last week in the Tournament of Champions at Santa Barbara.

After Thursday night’s fiasco, Morningside could drop out of the top 25.

Cannon County forward Julie Powell, a 5-11 senior who signed early with Vanderbilt, led all scorers with 25 points before fouling out with 7:29 left in the fourth quarter. Teammates Tara Solomon and Beth Stewart added 17 and 14 points.

Unlike Powell, Leslie received little help from her teammates.

She was the only Morningside player who scored in double figures for the second straight game. Sophomore forward Janet Davis, hobbled with a sprained ankle, saw limited playing time.

The defending California Division I champions will play South Pike High of Magnolia, Miss., in today’s third-place game. South Pike was the Mississippi Class 2-A champion last season.