Dalton State's Lee set for Jones Cup Invitational and more regional sports news

Dalton State's Tony Ingle was honored by HoopDirt.com as the NAIA basketball coach of the week.
Dalton State's Tony Ingle was honored by HoopDirt.com as the NAIA basketball coach of the week.
photo Dalton State's Tony Ingle was honored by HoopDirt.com as the NAIA basketball coach of the week.

Dalton State College freshman golfer S.M. Lee shot a 67 on the Plantation Course at Sea Island, Ga., on Monday and with it earned a spot in the Jones Cup Invitational to be held Feb. 3-5 at Sea Island's Ocean Forest Golf Club. It is regarded as one of the top 30 men's amateur tournaments in the world, and this year's field includes top-30 amateurs Matthias Schwab from Vanderbilt, Nick Hardy from the University of Illinois and Dawson Armstrong from Lipscomb. Past participants include such PGA Tour notables as Dustin Johnson, Bubba Watson, Webb Simpson, Luke Donald, Rickie Fowler, Lucas Glover, Brandt Snedeker, D.J. Trahan, Patrick Reed and former Baylor School standout Luke List, the 2007 Jones Cup champion.

* Former University of Tennessee at Chattanooga golfer Emily McLennan, a 2016 graduate, recently notched her first pro victory - the Mulpha Norwest Pro-Am on the Australian Ladies Professional. She shot 5 under par in the event at Castle Hill Country Club in Sydney that included two other ex-Mocs, former champ Emma de Groot and 2016 Olympian Christine Wolf from the class of 2011. McLennan is set for the Symetra Tour with Jordan Britt ('15) and de Groot, who was 25th on its money list in 2016, and Wolf and Agathe Sauzon ('15) earned Ladies European Tour cards.

Basketball

* Dalton State's Tony Ingle got the HoopDirt.com national honor as NAIA men's basketball coach of the week as the Roadrunners extended their winning streak to nine games and rose to 14-1 with road wins at Middle Georgia State and William Carey. They are now 15-1, 7-1 in the Southern States Athletic Conference, after Monday's victory at Blue Mountain, and they climbed to No. 6 in the NAIA Division I poll Tuesday.

* Sewanee senior Brody Stone was chosen the Southern Athletic Association men's basketball player of the week for the second time this season after averaging 21.5 points, 17 rebounds and 3.5 assists in two games this past weekend. He shot 56.7 percent from the field and 81.8 percent from the free-throw line. He leads the SAA in rebounding with 10.6 per game and is fourth in scoring at 16.5.

Track & Field

* UTC cross country and women's track coach Andy Meyer announced his first three signees since he took the job in the fall, and one of them followed him from Dalton State College: former Heritage High School standout Emily Poole, a two-time SSAC cross country champion and NAIA All-American. The other signees are high school seniors Jake Ethridge from Oak Ridge High and Sophia Neglia from Dobyns-Bennett. Poole also won the SSAC 1500- and 5000-meter track championships as a DSC freshman. Ethridge won the Region 2-AAA cross country meet, among others, this past fall and was all-state, and his parents competed in cross country and track for Belmont and Sewanee. Neglia is a six-time Southeastern Championships qualifier in swimming and a three-time all-region runner for the Kingsport school's state-runner-up cross country team. Her father ran for La Salle.

* Apart from Avery Hubbard's already reported open/college division success in the 60- and 200-meter dashes at East Tennessee State's indoor track and field meet this past weekend, the Chattanooga Jets accumulated two second-place finishes, five thirds and two fourths among 14 top-eights in the high-school-age competition. Nicole Johnson's runner-up 7.63-second time in the girls' 60 qualified her for the New Balance indoor nationals, and she was fourth in the 200. Kedrick and Kendrick Wilbanks were second and fifth in the boys' 60 in 7.01 and 7.05 and tied for third in the 200 at 22.61. Other Jets thirds came from Kimbra Dunning in the girls' long jump and triple jump and Alayah Dozier in the 400. Brevin Sims was fourth in the boys' 60 hurdles. Hubbard's winning 6.70 in the men's 60 qualified him for the USA Indoor Championships in early March in Albuquerque, N.M. That meet will include professional runners.

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