By Curtis Rockwell/Sports Director

A pair of teams from Pearl River County are headed to play for a state championship next week.
And no, it’s not football season.
Nope. Instead, its a week before Memorial Day, which means it’s time for the annual sojurn to Trustmark Park in Pearl for the overall state baseball championships. Seven state titles will be handed out late next week, and the action gets underway on Tuesday.

Both Pearl River Central and Poplarville will be heading north to take part and continue the chase for a state title. Which, unlike football, is a rarity in baseball in Pearl River County.
In fact, Poplarville has never won a state title on the baseball diamond, while PRC and Picayune have each captured just one apiece.
Both of the “Southern Six” squads waste no time in getting started, as both see action early Tuesday in the first two games of the annual affair.
In Class 4A, Poplarville takes on Mooreville at 10 a.m., in the Class 4A competition, while PRC faces Saltillo in Class 6A play at 1 p.m.
All seven state championship series are best-of-three affairs.

This is just the second trip overall to the state finals for the Hornets, and the first in 52 years when PHS fell to Kosciusko in 1974.
Poplarville, led by former Hornet standout player Ashley Graeter, will have been off for 10 days when it takes the biggest stage in prep baseball in the state against the Troopers just after breakfast Tuesday morning.
The Hornets swept perennial state power West Lauderdale in the Class 4A South State finals, which ended last Saturday night amidst a rain shower in Poplarville.
Moorevile, ironically enough, slipped past Kosciusko in the North State finals in three games.
Then, immediately following that game, PRC is back in action at the overall state tourney for the first time since winning the Class 5A title in 2017, and just the second time ever.

Second-year Blue Devils head coach Buddy Turnage and his troops slipped past George County, the two-time and defending Class 6A South State champs, Friday night on the road in Lucedale in the rubber match of the latest version of that triology, after the Rebels ended the season for PRC the last two seasons one step away from the state finals.
Now, defending Class 6A state champ Saltillo awaits PRC. The Tigers swept Germantown in two straight games in the Class 6A North State championship match-up. Saltillo swept George County for the crown last year.
Both the Class 4A and Class 6A state championship series will be contested again on Wednesday for the respective game twos in each affair. PRC meets SHS at 1 p.m., and PHS meets MHS at 7 p.m.
A game three, if needed, for the Blue Devils and Tigers would be Thursday at 10 a.m. A Game three, if needed, for the Hornets and Troopers would take place at 10 a.m., Friday morning.