It was a fun night at the Smoothie King Center as the Pelicans defeated the Dallas Mavericks 132-106. Anthony Davis had 27 points and a career-high nine assists. Julius Randle also had 27 points and grabbed 18 rebounds as New Orleans improved to 13-and-13 on the season. The Pels will be back at home tomorrow against the Grizzlies.
The Saints are 7.5 point favorites this Sunday as they’ll visit the Tampa Bay Bucs. Tampa beat New Orleans in the season opener and they have won two in a row. Saints wide out Michael Thomas did not practice yesterday. But offensive tackle Terron Armstead was back at practice after missing the last three games.
Three state championship football games will be played today in the Mercedes Benz Superdome. At noon, Oak Grove goes for its first state title since 2001 when they face Kentwood. At 3:30…it’s Lafayette Christian versus Ascension Catholic. At 7 PM, it’s Notre Dame versus Catholic of New Iberia. All of the games can be seen on CST or streamed on the N-F-H-S Network.
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McNeese has named Sterlin Gilbert as its new football coach. The past two seasons, Gilbert was the offensive coordinator at South Florida. The Bulls averaged 444 yards of total offense and 32 points a game this past season en route to a 7-5 record. He’ll be introduced to the Lake Charles media on Friday.
Grambling State and its athletics director Paul Bryant have decided to go their separate ways. Bryant will leave the school at the end of the month and President Rick Gallot says the vice president for student affairs, David Ponton, will take over as A-D. Gallot says Bryant wants to explore other opportunities.
Louisiana Tech’s Jaylon Ferguson has been named Conference USA Defensive Player of the Year. The St. Francisville native set a school record with 15 sacks this year and is two sacks away from becoming the alltime sack leader in NCAA Football history.
On the hardwood, the Ragin Cajuns defeated Loyola University of New Orleans 97-84 as JaKeenan Gant had 21 points. Also, UNO over South Alabama 71-60 and Tulane topped Tennessee-Martin 87-74.