By CURTIS ROCKWELL/Sports Director

As the new prep basketball season reaches its sixth week of play, a quartet of “Southern Six” squads remain unbeaten even as region play tipped off over the past seven days or so.

A trio of girls’ teams and one boys’ squad are all still sailing along at a perfect clip and hoping to reach the upcoming Christmas holiday break and remain unbeaten in the process.

On the girl’s side of the ledger, Hancock (12-0), Biloxi (10-0) and St. Martin (13-0) all have gotten off to impressive starts to the season and on the boy’s side Gulfport stands a “Southern Six” best 12-0 as does the Lady Yellow Jackets in the girl’s arena.

Visiting Gulfport stormed into St. Martin Tuesday night and thumped the home-standing Yellow Jackets 71-43 to move to that perfect 12-0 mark under the new regime of first year head coach Brian Butler. The win followed up another comfortable win over Harrison Central 71-27 on Friday in the Region 4-7A opener for the Admirals.

Gulfport has already topped last season’s win total of just nine wins.

“I’m very proud of our guys and how they’ve taken care of business in the beginning of this season,” Butler, who became the first-ever African-American head hoops coach in GHS boys history this year, said. “This is a very special group of young men, with endless potential, that are truly excited about creating their own legacy within the storied tradition of Gulfport basketball.”

Meanwhile, the Hancock girls have started a season off at 12-0 for the third straight season under veteran head coach Jamie Sisco. The Lady Hawks are aiming to make a return trip to The Big House in Jackson for the overall Class 6A Final Four again in early March at The Mississippi Coliseum.

The St. Martin girls are also looking to make a return trip in Class 7A to the Capital City as well this season.

“Super 7” in the “Southern 6”

Every Tuesday through the second week of March, we will publish our “Super 7 in the Southern 6” weekly boys and girls basketball polls involving all 48 prep basketball teams in our coverage area.

The weekly poll is the only one in the state that is voted on by a panel of veteran sportswriters, a few selected area coaches and other media members.

This week is the initial rankings for the 2024-2025 season:

“Super 7 in the Southern 6” (Boys)

1. Gulfport
2. Pascagoula
3. Biloxi
4. D’Iberville
5. Ocean springs
6. St. Martin
7. Gautier

“Super 7 in the Southern 6” (Girls)

1. Hancock
2. Biloxi
3. St. Martin
4. West Harrison
5. Harrison Central
6. St. Patrick
7. Bay High