SPORTS

Lexington’s Marshall offered by UT, others

Brandon Shields

First-year Lexington High boys’ basketball coach Andrew Hicks confirmed Friday night Tigers basketball player Nick Marshall has received four NCAA Division I offers to play at the next level.

The most recent came on Thursday from the University of Tennessee.

“Nick’s playing in an AAU tournament in Atlanta this week, and Coach [Donnie] Tyndall was there too and saw him play,” Hicks said. “Nick told me he got an offer, and Coach will touch base with me when he gets back into Knoxville.”

Marshall is listed on the Future 150 recruiting Web site as 6-feet-11 and 230 pounds and the No. 70 player in the country. He’s the 10th-ranked center in the nation.

Hicks said Marshall was offered by Memphis earlier in the summer.

“It was actually my first week on the job here,” Hicks said. “At that point I hadn’t seen him play in person, but I’d heard he was really talented and has a lot of ability.”

In addition to the two state schools, Ole Miss and Mississippi State have also offered Marshall a scholarship, and Hicks said there are a number of other schools interested in his services.

Hardin County’s Channell wins bowling national championship: Rising Hardin County High sophomore Ashley Channell won the 15U Junior Gold National Championships in bowling in Buffalo, N.Y.

Channell, who will turn 15 years old in two weeks, said she bowled 45 games throughout the week to get to the championship.

“We bowled five games on Monday, then five on Tuesday and then five on Wednesday,” Channell said. “We started out with 208 bowlers, and those 15 games were used to narrow it down to 30.”

Channell said they bowled five more games to narrow it to the top 20, and then the field was 16 after five more games. That’s when the competition became a match-play double-elimination tournament with each match being two games.

Channell won all 10 of her games to sweep the tournament for the championship.

“It feels good to win this championship because I was close to winning last year before another girl had to beat me twice for the championship, and she did,” Channell said.

Channell will represent the United States in the Tournament of Americas in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., starting next weekend. Her performance this past week qualifies her to compete for Team USA in the 2015 competition.

Channell’s high score of the week was 236 with her lowest being 166.

Brandon Shields, 425-9751