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Liberty teen sacks her way to a $1,000 prize!

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LIBERTY, MO (KCTV) -

Jennifer Malicoat likes to go by the name MacKinzie. But, whether it's Jennifer or MacKinzie, you should know this about the 18-year old from Liberty - she can really sack groceries.

In fact, she's one of the best sackers in the country, bringing homethird prize in a recent national grocery sacking contest sponsored by the National Grocers' Association.

Malicoat bested 24 other sackers in the contest, which took place at the Mirage Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas during the association's national convention. She sacked a first time to reach the finals pitting the top five sack specialists against one another, then again in the final "sack off." For her efforts, Malicoat, a Liberty High School senior who sacks groceries at the Liberty Price Chopper on 291 Highway, won $1,000 and a lot of respect.

"She's just a natural," said Debbie Reek, officer manager at the Liberty Chopper. "MacKenzie had to win our store competition with 27 Price Choppers competing, then the Missouri contest down in Branson with even more sackers to stack up against, before she even got to Vegas. When she started competing, she had only worked here about three months," Reek continued.

Now, abouta year into her tenure at Price Chopper, Malicoat has defeated nearly 100 of the bestgrocery sackers in the country. What's it like to compete on the big stage in Sin City?

"I was more excited than nervous," Malicoat said. "There were a lot of people there, folks attending the convention, and families of the people competing, but I just focused on the items."

Malicoat and the others competed in three categories: timing, technique and weight. The timing is obvious. Malicoat's time was :58.I'm not sure what the Russian and French judges (just kidding) were looking for with technique, but with regards to weight, the key was evenly distributing the items among the threebags competitors were given.

Malicoat said it was no big deal.

"The hardest part was all the small items: tiny cans, soap and other things that were tough to handle. I just tried to keep everything in the right categories anddistribute them evenly among thebags," she said.

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Liberty teen sacks her way to a $1,000 prize!

Liberty rolls past Whitehall 58-38 in the District 11 4A tournament

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Perhaps no one has experienced more success in local basketball in recent years than Liberty High's boys program.

Not only have the Hurricanes won three Lehigh Valley Conference titles in the past six seasons, but they've also qualified for the state tournament seven times in the last eight years.

But this year has been different for Liberty, which had to scramble to schedule and then win a makeup game last week just to qualify for the District 11 Class 4A tournament.

Once in, however, it seems like old times for Liberty, which scored 19 unanswered points in the second half Wednesday night to turn a three-point game into a 58-38 rout of host Whitehall in a 4A preliminary-round game.

The Hurricanes (12-11) earned a Saturday night date with No. 1 seed and Mountain Valley Conference champ Pocono Mountain West at Pleasant Valley in the second game of a 4A quarterfinal. Stroudsburg and East Stroudsburg North will meet in the 6 p.m. opener.

Jaevan Dobbins and Ludwin Gonzalez scored 17 points apiece and Deshawn Oyeniyi added 12 points and 12 rebounds as Liberty ended Whitehall's season at 13-10.

"It's a good time of year to be playing arguably our best basketball," Hurricanes coach Chad Landis said. "It's a credit to the guys and their determination to not have the season end. We've been pretty close a couple of times to not making it through."

But there was nothing close about this one, at least in the fourth quarter.

Whitehall led 5-2 and 7-4 early, but spent most of the night playing from behind. The Zephs trailed 28-17 at halftime, but rode the hot hand of senior Aaron Keglovits to get within 39-36 after a Keglovits trey with 1:20 left in the third quarter.

The Zephyrs wouldn't score again, however, until 2:45 was left and Liberty had used the aforementioned 19-0 run to go up 58-36.

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Liberty rolls past Whitehall 58-38 in the District 11 4A tournament


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