Warren Central players hoist the Division 6-5A championship trophy after beating Natchez, 64-40, on Friday night. (Melanie Duncan ThortisThe Vicksburg Post)

The last time Warren Central won a division championship, most of its players were just learning how to stop dribbling food and start dribbling a basketball.

After Friday night’s win in the Division 6-5A Tournament championship game, the Vikings are starting to have dreams of dribbling a golden basketball.

Marcus Harvey scored a game-high 16 points, and Brian Phelps and Seddrick Williams each had 13 to lead WC to a 64-40 rout of Natchez and its first division title since the 1991-92 season.

WC will host Moss Point on Tuesday in the South State satellite game, while Natchez will travel to Ocean Springs on Tuesday.

“It feels real good. I’ve been associated with Warren Central basketball since I was in fifth grade. That’s the way to end my senior year, personally,” said Phelps, who also had a team-high seven rebounds and three assists. “I know all the seniors have had a good year so far. We came out and put the fire in them. We’ve got a lot of young guys and we’re trying to get them in the winning mood. All of us just put our hearts into it the last few games.”

It didn’t take long for the Vikings to run Natchez into the ground.

After a frantic but even first quarter, WC used an up-tempo offense and press defense to go on a 10-2 run early in the second. The run put WC ahead 21-12 with 4 minutes to play in the quarter, and it never trailed again.

As Natchez struggled to keep pace with the Vikings, it was also hurt by foul trouble and poor shooting. Two starters had two fouls by the end of the first quarter, and WC was in the double-bonus by the middle of the second. The Bulldogs were also 2-for-8 shooting in the first quarter and 6-for-19 in the first half.

“The press, we were ready for it. We practiced for it, but it didn’t look like we were executing. If we had executed, I think it would have come out better,” said Natchez’s DaMorris Merrick, who led the team with seven points and seven rebounds. “We worked all summer to get here, and then to fall short, it hurts.”

WC extended the lead to 32-14 with a minute to play in the first half before Natchez closed with a 5-0 run to cut it to 32-19 at the break. The Vikings started the second half by spreading the ball and milking the clock, but it resulted in a pair of turnovers and two quick Bulldog baskets.

So, with the lead back under 10 points, WC coach Jesse Johnson decided to turn the heat back up. The Vikings went back to the press and promptly went on a 12-2 run to stretch the lead to 44-25 late in the third quarter.

“We got away from what we do best, and that’s run the ball. It’s hard to slow down a team that loves to run, and these guys love to push it up the floor,” said Johnson, who is in his first season as coach of the Vikings. “That shows our mental capacity for the game is not where it should be, but they love to run. It did backfire on us, but that’s when I took it off and just started to let them run again.”

Phelps put the exclamation point on the game early.

With just over 6 minutes to play in the fourth quarter, Phelps came away with a steal and threw down a monstrous, two-handed breakaway slam dunk to put WC ahead 48-27.

Natchez seemed to go into panic mode after that, firing up 3-pointers on nearly every trip up the floor and missing most of them until the victory was secure for the Vikings.

WC kept the lead over 20 points for all but a few moments after Phelps’ dunk, and was never threatened.

“That switched the momentum right there,” Harvey said of Phelps’ dunk. “When he dunked it, everybody got up off their feet and it was like, we’ve got to take this to the house.'”

Hinds AHS 69, Loyd Star 50

Joseph White scored a game-high 20 points, grabbed 20 rebounds and blocked three shots to lead Hinds AHS over Loyd Star for the Division 6-2A championship on Friday night.

The War Dawgs (23-7) will host a first-round playoff game on Tuesday night.

K’Swaya Moffett added 13 points and Antonio Richardson chipped in 12 in the victory.

Hinds AHS led by only four points at the end of the third quarter, but exploded for 27 fourth-quarter points to put the game away.