East Mississippi's Miles Respess set to tee off at NJCAA Division II Men's Golf Championship
For the third time in the last five years, East Mississippi Community College is being represented in the NJCAA Division II Men's Golf Championship. EMCC sophomore Miles Respess begins competition Tuesday in the four-day national tournament being held at Goose Pond Colony Golf Course in Scottsboro, Ala.
SCOOBA – For the third time in the last five years, East Mississippi Community College is being represented in the NJCAA Division II Men's Golf Championship. EMCC sophomore Miles Respess begins competition Tuesday in the four-day national tournament being held at Goose Pond Colony Golf Course in Scottsboro, Ala.
Respess, from Paragould, Ark., qualified for this week's NJCAA Championship by tying for fourth place (76-76—152) during last month's NJCAA Region 23 Championship played at Dancing Rabbit Golf Club. With top-five finishes in each of his last three tournaments played, Respess tied for fifth (72-73—145) at this year's MACJC State Golf Championship to help lead head coach Dale Peay's 20th-ranked EMCC Lions to a third consecutive state runner-up golf finish.
In addition to claiming NJCAA All-Region 23 honors this year, Respess played his way onto the MACJC All-State Second Team to give EMCC a school-best three all-state golfers in 2013. Caleb Westmoreland, a product of Heritage Academy, earned first-team honors, while fellow EMCC sophomore Nick Davis, of Springville, Ala., also collected second-team plaudits.
Set to tee off at 7:54 a.m. Tuesday, Respess presently owns a team-leading 77.2 stroke average for the 2013 campaign. He owns four top-five finishes in seven tournaments this spring, including tying for runner-up honors (73-71—144) at the EMCC-hosted, regular-season finale played at the Mississippi State University Golf Course in Starkville.
Respess becomes the seventh golfer in school history to represent East Mississippi Community College in the NJCAA Championship. Most recently, Weston Wallace (Northwest Rankin HS) and Zack Bailey (Caledonia HS) participated in the 2011 national tournament two years ago at Goose Pond Colony. Previously for Coach Peay's EMCC Lions, Hal Larkin (Caledonia HS) tied for 53rd place at the 2009 NJCAA Division II Championship also held at Goose Pond.
Prior EMCC participants to compete in the NJCAA Men's Golf Championship were Gary Sheppard (2004 in Arizona), Matt King (2001 in Texas) and Drew McBrayer (1999 in North Carolina).
A total of 43 schools will be represented at this week's (May 21-24) NJCAA Division II Men's Golf Championship, including 18 full teams and selected individual qualifiers from other junior colleges throughout the country. Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College will represent the Mississippi Association of Community and Junior Colleges for the sixth consecutive year as six-time reigning NJCAA Region 23 team champions.
The MACJC will also be represented individually at nationals this week by Copiah-Lincoln's Corbin May, Shelby Patterson of East Central, Jones County's Branning Dykes, and Chad Cupples of Northwest Mississippi.
With a four-star rating by Golf Digest magazine, Goose Pond Colony is a George Cobb-designed course that sits on the banks of the Tennessee River's Lake Guntersville and nestled into the Cumberland Mountains. The par-72 layout will play 7,101 yards to a rating of 73.1, slope 129. Daily results from this week's national tournament will be available online at http://www.mccaa.org/f/0/3/Golf/2013_Golf_Nationals.php.