MOULTRIE — In the days when Georgia high school girls played three-on-three basketball, it was the forwards who did the scoring and the guards played defense.

And so it was that the guards’ contributions to a team’s success often might have gone under-appreciated.

But it was hard not to notice Nina Brannon and her work against Decatur in the Class AA state championship game on March 4, 1955, in the Moultrie High gymnasium.

Brannon, just a sophomore for coach Jim Nolan’s Packerettes, was one of Moultrie High three guards — along with Ouida George and Sherry Spooner — that night as the team chased its second straight state championship.

With 50 seconds left in the game, Moultrie Betty Piland hit a free throw to put the Lady Packers up 33-32.

Moments later, Brannon grabbed a jump ball to give the Packerettes possession and flipped to Ruby Hester, who was fouled.

Hester missed both free throw attempts, but when Decatur took possession, Brannon intercepted a pass and fed teammate Ouida George.

George got the ball to Hester, who banked a basket home off the backboard to give Moultrie a 3-point lead with 40 seconds left. Decatur scored in the waning seconds, but it was not enough.

Brannon, Spooner and Betty Piland were named All-State that season and Cooper went on to start two more years for the Packerettes under Martin Allman.

Twice, Nina Brannon was named Moultrie High’s outstanding athlete, joining Jimmy Vickers one year and John Stewart the other.

She also played recreation softball and basketball for many years in Colquitt County.

Now, 51 years after helping lead the Packerettes to their last state championship, Nina Brannon Cooper will be inducted into the Colquitt County Sports Hall of Fame at the annual banquet to be held on Sept. 28, at the Colquitt County High cafeteria.

She will join Jerry Croft, Richie DeMott, Veronica Freeman Reese, Linda Baxter Moseley, Jeffery Moss, Dennard Robison, James Stancil, Jill Middlebrooks Stuckey and Lonnie White in the Hall of Fame’s 2006 Class.

Nina Brannon was born April 4, 1939, in Henry County, Ala., but moved with her family to Moultrie as a child.

She began playing softball and basketball at Okapilco Elementary for principal Walt Thompson and as an eighth- and ninth-grader, played on the Moultrie High junior varsity.

By the time the 5-foot-4, 120-pounder reached the varsity as a sophomore for the 1954-1955, she joined a veteran team coming off a state championship.

She played a key role in helping the Packerettes win the title again using her speed and aggressiveness. Joining Cooper, Spooner, George, Hester and Betty Piland in the starting six that year was Alice Piland.

The state championship game in 1955 was the last for Nolan, who resigned to take a job with the State Highway Department.

Allman came to Moultrie from Roberta to take over the basketball teams and in 1956-57, the Packerettes won the region championship, but fell in the state tournament.

That season, Cooper played guard with Rhebia Barry and Ginger Rutledge. Alice Piland, Gwen Gay and Ann Lewis were the forwards.

“I really enjoyed it,” Cooper says of playing for Nolan and Allman, a West Virginian who came to Moultrie after coaching four seasons at Roberta High.

Cooper excelled as a defensive specialist and is the first guard from that era selected to the Colquitt County Sports Hall of Fame.

Stories in The Moultrie Observer about the Packerette teams during her three seasons often highlighted her timely steals.

As a junior, she stole a pass and got the ball to Alice Piland who scored with 20 seconds left to beat Abraham Baldwin 35-34 in Allman’s first game as the Packerettes head coach.

She also says she would like to have played basketball as it is now.

Half-court basketball was played by girls until the middle 1970s.

“I think I could have played full-court,” said.

Cooper was involved softball for many years in Colquitt County, playing for Swift and Local 522 for Walt Hester, Sunstate for Johnny Bozeman, Moultrie National Bank for Bo Causey, Mike Clark, Edwin Hortman and Kenneth Summerour and Dairy Queen for Dorsey Smith.

She also played for the Simmons Lime tournament team out of Cordele.

She won two Most Valuable Player trophies and also played recreation basketball for a number of years.

In 1970, she married Tony Cooper. She had three girls at the time and Cooper had two girls and a boy.

It did not keep her from going to the softball fields.

“After the games, we get in the car and the first thing we did was take roll,” she said.

Coopers daughters are Sherry Davis, Sheila McEntire and Gwen Singley. She also has 15 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.