Several alumni of Russellville and Logan County high schools have been involved in fall and winter professional and college sports the last five months.
      News and notes about some of them follow:
Pro Basketball
     The new Kentucky entry in the American Basketball Association, which is off to a great start, has a decided Russellville flavor. The coach and three of the players for the Kentucky Bisons are former Panthers.
     The coach is Otis Key, who played three years for Austin Peay, then his senior season at Lincoln University, followed by a few years in the Canary Islands, and then eight years as a Harlem Globetrotter. His previous coaching experience was as an assistant coach of the Logan County Cougars.
     The roster has included RHS alumni Michael Morris, who had a couple of good years in a tough juco league in Florida; Teco Dickerson, who played on a national championship football team at Western before successfully walking on to the Topper basketball team; and 6-7 Thad Key, Otis’ little brother who
played for that same junior college in Florida as Michael before helping Kentucky Wesleyan win a national Division II championship. Thad was not on the roster in late January.
    The Bisons, who were originally scheduled to be a Bowling Green team, are now based in Owensboro with games on the same SportsCenter floor which Thad’s KWC teams calls home.
     Another local connection on the team is Mike Wells, a great player  for WKU who is the son of former Auburn High School players  Charles Wells and the brother of former RHS and APSU star Bubba Wells, who also played in the NBA and for the Globetrotters. He’s been playing pro ball all over the world.
     Other Bisons’ names you’ll recognize include former UK player and Mr. Basketball Brandon Stockton of Glasgow; Boris Siakim of Caverna, who helped WKU reach the NCAA Sweet Sixteen last year; former Butler County and Bellarmine player Jamie Jackson; and former WKU standout Derek Robinson.
     By mid-January the Bisons (yes, they do put an s on their name) were 9-4 and were averaging 116 points per game.
     The Bisons have seven home games scheduled in February and March. You can find their schedule, ticket prices and more information about the team atwww.kentuckybisons.com . 
    Meanwhile, a teammate of Morris and Dickerson at RHS is leading the Czech League in scoring. Squeaky Hampton, who is called by his given name Maurice overseas, has an average of 20.2 points per game. He’s scored more than 20 in 11 of the 20 games and has been in double figures in 19 of the 20. He’s hit 44 treys, including connecting on better than 50 percent in 8 contests and on 41 percent on all his long-range attempts. Nice companions to the 3-pointers are his 43 assists and 40 steals. From 2-point range he’s hitting 53.4 percent along with 81.4 percent from the foul line. He plays 31 minutes per outing.
     Squeaky’s team, BK Kondori Liberec, is in the middle of the league standings (5^th of 11 teams) at 9-11.
     Hampton, who was Austin Peay’s basketball MVP three years ago, played two outstanding seasons in Scotland but was ready to move on to a bigger, more competitive league this season. He was home during the Christmas holidays.

Centre College
     Nearing the end of an praise-worthy college basketball career, Russellville’s T.C. Thomason has been an important part of four outstanding seasons in Danville. After 15 games of the current season, the
Colonels had a 12-3 record. T.C. was leading the team in offensive rebounds (2.1 per game) and was second in scoring (11.8), field goal attempts, field goals made, assists and steals. He was third in rebounding (4.7), blocked shots and minutes played.
    He ranked 22^nd in the 12-team Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference in scoring and 9^thin offensive rebounds. He also helps mightily on a defense which leads the SCAC-- allowing just 60.1 points per game.
   T.C. has started 71 of Centre’s last 72 games. In his two and a half seasons as a Centre starters, the Colonels have compiled a record of 85-11.
   Junior John Michael Starks was once again the Colonels’ kicker all football season. The RHS alumnus booted all 46 kickoffs for the 7-3 Colonels, averaging 53.3 yards per kick with a 17.8 return average. In contrast, opponents’ kickoffs averaged 55.0 yards but with a return average of 23.2, so Starks’ net kicking results were 35.5 while his opposing counterparts had a lesser net of 31.8 yards.
     On offense, Starks was the team’s second leading scorer with 35 points. He was 4 of 5 on field goal attempts and 23 of 31 on extra points. His longest field goal was from 40 yards against Austin, and he connected on a 37-yarder against Rhodes, 28-yarder against Hanover and 26-yarder against Hanover. The one he missed was blocked from 
40 yards out. Starks also plays baseball for the Colonels. 
     Jordan Hinton played in five games for the football Colonels last fall. He was converted from quarterback to running back/receiver. In his second year out of RHS, he carried the ball 6 times for 10 yards. He caught 6 passes for 72 yards, one of which was a 22-yarder, and averaged 14.4 yards per catch. He finished 15^th on the team in total offense.
     Hinton, who played in one basketball game as a freshman, is not on the Colonels’ roundball team this year.

Benton a Wildcat
      Freshman Mikie Benton made the University of Kentucky football team as an invited walk-on. Although he was redshirted, he got to be in uniform on the sidelines for UK’s win in the Liberty Bowl. It was the third straight year a local guy had been part of the Wildcats’ winning a bowl game with former Cougar Terry Clayton wearing blue and white the previous two seasons in the Music City Bowl.

Kentucky Wesleyan
      When you click on the Kentucky Wesleyan College volleyball website, the picture that greets you is of Becca Grayson, a sophomore from Logan County. She led the KWC Lady Panthers in sets with 659, some 400 more than the second place finisher. Becca was third in digs with 2.14 each in each of her 121 games played. She added 13 kills, 20 serves and 4 blocks and 8 block assists among her 94 total attacks.
     Grayson set a Wesleyan record by amassing an amazing 44 assists in a single game.
     Wesleyan volleyball had a dismal record when she arrived in Owensboro. The team finished 7-29 this fall.
     On the women’s basketball roster at Wesleyan is Kara Haley, a 2006 graduate of LCHS. As a freshman she was Academic All-Great Lakes Valley Conference selection and started four games. She had shoulder surgery before her sophomore season and sat out all last year, a medical redshirt season. Although she’s still on the Lady Panther roster, Haley has not yet been able to play this season while she’s concentrating on rehab.

Koller begins college career
     After winning two state golf championships while playing for RHS, Nikki Koller has begun her college career as a member of the Arizona Wildcats, the team ranked 13^th in the nation in
a preseason poll.
     Her first collegiate action was close to home in the 2008 Mason Rudolph Championships at Vanderbilt Legends Club in Franklin, Tenn. After carding the lowest round of the day for the team on Saturday, Koller finished her first collegiate event with a round of 77 (+5) and recorded a three-round total of 232 to finish 16-over par.
     In her second tournament, she had an even-par back nine on the way to a 79 in the Windy City Collegiate at the Evanston Golf Club in Skokie, Ill. In her next outing at the Stanford/Pepsi Invitational at the Stanford Golf Course in Tucson, she shot 81-79-79.
     Arizona’s spring portion of the schedule begins a three-day run Feb. 22. Although it’s known as the Arizona Wildcat Invitational, the site is Puerto Penasco, Sonora, Mexico.

Major college swimmers from R’ville
     RHS graduate Anne Chambers is in her second season swimming for the University of Louisville. Anne added depth to the Cardinal breaststrokers as a freshman, swimming the 100- and 200-Breast at the 2008 Big East Championships. She also represented U of L well at the 2007 Purdue Invite, turning in a lifetime best in the 200 IM with a 2:18.69.
     The University of Florida swim team is unbelievably deep, yet Russellvillian Rebekah Epley recorded the best time of all 18 Lady Gators who swam the 200 Individual Medley during the fall. She finished the distance in 2:00.88 in the Princeton Invite in Princeton, N.J. Her 54.69 time in the 100 backstroke in that same meet was the 4^th best of 14 Florida backstrokers in the fall.

Campbellsville Notes
     As a junior defensive lineman, Russellville’s Daniel Elliott recorded 29 tackles for the Campbellsville University Tigers, including 10 unassisted. He was credited with 1.5 tackles for a loss.
     Speaking of a loss, Campbellsville downsized Elliott. The press guide had him listed at 6-4, 290 pounds as a sophomore. This year the numbers were 6-2, 265. Losing weight is tough, but knocking off 25 pounds is much easier than dropping two inches in stature.
    Two freshmen from RHS spent the fall as redshirts at Campbellsville. Donnie Bigbeeshould play for the Tigers next year. RHS Coach John Myers says Dustin Sydnortransferred from CU at the semester break and now is a student at Kentucky State University where he may run track.