Brad Locke: Time to turn the page to basketball
Now that football season has wrapped, we can turn more of our attention to hoops. There have been some interesting developments to this point, so here are a few notes from the hardwood.
Rick Cleveland: How crazy is college football today? ‘Coach O’ probably summed it up best
It is only appropriate that in this – surely the strangest college football season ever – Indiana, the team that entered the 2025 season with the most defeats of any team in college history, finishes the season with a perfect 12-0 record and the No. 1 seeding in the college football playoffs.
Rick Cleveland: Mississippi’s biggest sports event ever? You wouldn’t want to argue with John L.
Ole Miss will play host to Tulane in a first round college football playoffs game on Dec. 20 and some pundits already proclaim it the biggest, most important sports event to ever take place on Mississippi soil.
Kevin Tate: At some meals, it’s only the thought that counts
Bacon and sausage sputtered in a huge skillet, the focal point for every silent someone in the room. Blue flames from the stove’s eye lapped across the bottom of the pan as excited beads of oil rained down. The Old Man in charge of the cooking jumped and grunted at those that found his arm as he turned the heat down low.
For Rebels’ new boss Pete Golding, the coaching bug first bit at Delta State
First things first: Pete Golding, the new head football coach at Ole Miss, could not be more different from his predecessor, Lane Kiffin. Put it this way: You will not likely find Golding spending his Oxford mornings in a hot yoga class.
Office Hours: When the circus comes to town
You may not have noticed during ESPN’s breathless “will-he-or-won’t-he” coverage of the Lane Kiffin saga, but there was a football game Friday in Starkville.
Kiffin chaos: Inside the strangest 2 days – 2 weeks? – of my journalism career
I’m admittedly not a morning person. I blame that on my sportswriter roots – if I was supposed to wake up early, would more than half of the sporting events I cover happen at night? Just a thought.
Gifts of adventure are the very best loot of all
As far as adventures were concerned, the Old Man was the founder of practically all the feasts he ever enjoyed. He thought of them, he planned them, he invited whatever guests he wanted to attend, if any, then he supervised the adventures’ execution and saw them through to the end. They did not come off without difficulty or adjustment along the way, but neither did they collapse into utter ruin short of their goals. Some worked better than others, but they came to pass, each functioning about as reliably as the average reliability of the people involved.
Sports Column: Olympic and world champion Reese heads Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2026
Brittney Reese, a seven-time world champion and Olympic golf medalist long jumper, headlines the 2026 Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame induction class announced at the MSHOF museum Wednesday.
Outdoors Column: Colorado tale brings back experiences in a flash
Two traveling elk hunters came to the end of their trail this past September in Colorado when a late summer thunderstorm overtook them. Sometimes, there’s just nothing you can do. It reminded me of a hunt I was on myself some years ago.
Sports Column: Let’s call it ‘The Lane Kiffin Bowl, presented by Jimmy Sexton’
If today’s Florida-Ole Miss football game were a bowl game, we all know what its name would be: The Lane Kiffin Bowl.
Outdoors Column: Clay target pursuits offer wonderful escape from the everyday
As an unblemished target coasted to the ground far down the hillside, I heard the Old Man’s voice chuckle somewhere in time.
Outdoors Feature: Bradham battles through intense career of development to championship
Caile Bradham, of Belden, captured both the High Over All and High All Around titles at the 2025 National Skeet Shooting Association championships in October, reaffirming his accomplishment of one lifelong dream and claiming another.
Everything outdoors gets better come November
With Halloween done and the prospect of parades and visits with Santa still over the horizon, society tells the child in all of us the best of the year still lies somewhat ahead, but I’ve always thought the best things happen in November.
Outdoors Column: Memories made tangible evoke deeper art
The best taxidermists must be hunters and anglers themselves first because, far more than preserving animal parts, they’re preserving memories.
Deja vu all over again
You could almost see it coming. The fourth quarter of Mississippi State’s latest gut-wrenching loss – this time to then-No. 22 Texas – seemed to
Sports Column: Tommy Kelly, a big man with big dreams, has turned around Lanier’s football team
Knolyn Bailey, a bright-eyed, just-turned-16-year-old, 10th grade running back, has grown up attending football games at Lanier High where his mother teaches.
Outdoors Column: Eyes of the critter failed connection with reality
The guy was very proud of his work and, mostly, I suppose, it was good.
Score one for Iceland: LSU’s Sveinsson wins Fallen Oak Invitational title
Many of the most accomplished college golfers in America gathered here over the weekend for the Fallen Oak Collegiate Invitational. So, naturally, the individual champion hails from about 3,700 miles away in Gardabaer, Iceland.
Childhood begins assembly of experiences unique to every outdoor life
Almost all of us who camp are just kids who camped and still do. That means all of the experiences around camping that facilitate our camping stories began happening at some finite historical point, albeit one that now lies far back in the mists of time. That’s part of what makes the introduction of camping for kids such a delicate balance.
County to start paying SPD for animal control assistance
July 8, 2025
By
