JHS Hollingsworth’s shooting clinic helps Vikings sizzle from 3-point arc 

Jasper High School senior guard Mia Hollingsworth took shooting accuracy to another level last week in perhaps the best quarter of 3-point shooting in AHSAA history. Hollingsworth scored 27 points in the opening quarter of the Lady Vikings’ 95-17 victory over Hayden last week with a 9-of-10 shooting effort from the 3-point arc. She took two shots in the second quarter – treys of course – and finished with 30 points on a 10-of-12 shooting night – to land in this week’s AHSAA Girls’ Basketball Spotlight.
     Her 27 points in the first period tied the AHSAA record for most points in a quarter – which was set in 2017 by Ranburne’s Jesse Ralston in a 66-24 victory over Randolph County. Carrollton’s Pam Duncan, who had 25 points in the first quarter in three games in her career, held the record for 23 years. Duncan is best remembered for her first shot in the 1994 AHSAA State Basketball tournament semifinals – a 3-pointer – that introduced girls’ basketball to the BJCC crowd in the first year that girls and boys played their tournaments at the same time at the same location.
     Duncan went on to land the Alabama Sportswriters Association Miss Basketball Award in 1994 and had an outstanding collegiate career at the University of Alabama.
     Back to Hollingsworth, she ranked first in the nation in 3-point shooting accuracy this season after the Hayden performance. She has made 91 treys in 195 attempts for a 47% accuracy rate through 25 games for the Vikings (24-3) of Coach Blake Laney. Her dad, Vess Hollingsworth, is also an assistant coach. She has made 492 treys – which ranks third all-time behind the NFHS national record holder Chloe Siegel of Deshler (588) and Covenant Christian’s Anna Claire Noblit (503). Siegel closed her prep career last season and Noblit finished in 2014.
     The 5-foot-8 guard is averaging 15.4 points a game – and was among the state’s leaders in steals and assists. A starter since the seventh grade – playing her first four seasons at Hamilton High School before moving to Jasper as a junior – she is currently just eight points shy of reaching 3,000 points in her prep career. An excellent ballhandler and defender, she is also an outstanding tennis player as well. With 2,992 points in 173 games over her storied career, an average 17.3 points per game, she is also has shot 80 percent from the foul line (358-of-447) for her career.  Sophomore Missy Odom is the team scoring leader with 19.3 points a game. Senior Idasia Mercer is the team leader in assists with 4.5 per game. Hollingsworth is averaging 3.2 assists.
    Jasper (23-4) sank 22 3-point goals as a team in the Hayden win with seven players drilling at least one. That total ties G.W. Long’s Lady Rebels for the most in a single game. In addition to Hollingsworth’s 10, Jakayla Kirk had four, Emma Lou Franks, three, Gracen Norris, two, while Mercer, Ally Grace Salors, and Odom had one each. G.W. Long sank 22 in a 101-23 win over Dale County in 2020.