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SPORTS OPINION: McNeal keeps South Side consistent, reaches 300 victories

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When Brent McNeal was named the head girls’ basketball coach at South Side in the spring of 2011, he wasn’t sure how long he’d be the Lady Hawks’ leader, but he knew how he wanted to lead them.

Fourteen years later, he’s led them to a state championship and undefeated season. They’ve become a regular in the state tournament to the point that the loud group of fans that sit at courtside as close to half-court as possible for maximum impact talking to the game officials could go ahead and reserve hotel stays in Murfreesboro in March before the season starts.

They didn’t win the district regular season championship last year, but that was an aberration. They get their opponents’ best shot on most nights, and some nights, that’s hard to see because South Side is that much better than some of its competition.

All of that goes back to McNeal and the culture he spent years building in the program to the point he doesn’t have to spend much time preaching to newcomers that this is how things are for Lady Hawks basketball.

They simply accept it for what it is.

“I don’t know if (winning the state championship) makes that point easier to make to a freshman, because (assistant coach Adrian Comer) and I still preach to those young players the same thing in tryouts and the first practices after they make the team,” McNeal told me in a conversation one time. “But it doesn’t take long for them to see that everyone who was already here have bought in and are part of the program.

“It’s how we succeed.”

The “how we succeed” McNeal referred to was the never-let-up, 90-to-nothing style of basketball where the defense is a 94-feet effort for all four quarters. The offense is almost always in fast-break mode, pushing the ball up the floor and making opposing defenders uncomfortable trying to keep up with where the ball is, where it’s headed and what all five players dressed in black and white are doing out there.

That style of play doesn’t just happen. No basketball player at any level between PAL League and the NBA can show up in November and play that way every game and be successful unless there’s months - even years - of work to simply be able to play at that level for an extended period.

And that’s why McNeal got his 300th win last week about halfway through his 14th season, which is an average of a little better than 22 wins per season.

In addition to all this, we haven’t mentioned yet how many former Lady Hawks have gone on to play at the collegiate level, which is 21.

Senior Jaidynn Askins will be the second former Lady Hawk to play at Murray State since McNeal has taken over, and others have gone to Division I, Division II, junior college and NAIA schools - giving him a legacy of developing quality players with a good foundation to succeed at the next level along with leading them to success while they’re in high school.

You can’t ask for much more out of a coach, except to continue to keep doing what he’s doing. He’s young enough, he could keep doing this for 20 more years, which would mean potentially 400 or 500 more wins before he’s done if the Lady Hawks keep winning at this level.

But already, Brent McNeal has proven he’s among the best coaches we’ve seen in West Tennessee and is working his way up to similar notoriety at the state level.

Brandon Shields is the managing editor of The Jackson Post. Reach him through e-mail at brandon@jacksonpost.news. Follow him on X.com @JSEditorBrandon. Follow him on Instagram @EditorBrandon.