Bulldogs improve to 6-0 behind Wiggins
North Forest lost coach Mike Ferrell, who went 33-13 in his four successful seasons, to Brazosport in January.
Then it lost its top two quarterbacks before the start of district.
It hasn’t lost on the field — and hadn’t allowed a point in District 11-4A Division I until Thursday night’s game — improving to a perfect 6-0 with an imperfect 32-20 victory over Kashmere at Delmar Stadium.
“I’m elated,” coach Clifton Terrell said. “The kids wanted to go through district without anyone scoring on us, (and) I told them that was a great goal, but I just wanted to make sure no one gets hurt.
“I want everybody healthy for the playoffs.”
Terrell is in his first year as head coach, but he isn’t new to North Forest.
He was with the old school district through its two high schools’ merger and absorption into Houston ISD, most recently as Ferrell’s defensive coordinator during back-to-back district championship seasons.
The Bulldogs boast 57 wins in the last six seasons. They haven’t won a second-round game.
“We talk about it a lot,” Terrell said. “That’s our main focus — what we do in the playoffs.”
With playoff success in mind, Terrell’s first order of business after replacing Ferrell was changing from a 3-4 to a 4-3 defense, hoping to improve the Bulldogs’ run stopping, which he felt was an Achilles’ heel.
“The last couple of years in the playoffs we were given up a lot of rushing yards, so we needed to fix that,” Terrell said.
The Bulldogs started with six new players rotating through the defensive line, and they slowed La Marque’s powerful running game enough to pull out a 36-31 win, despite losing starting quarterback D’Mond Joseph to a broken leg in the second half after he led them to a 29-3 halftime lead.
Then they went to work, with three straight district shutouts punctuated by a 40-0 rout of previously unbeaten Yates.
“At the time, their running back, (Reginald) Bryant, was the leading rusher in the district,” Terrell said. “He was ahead of (Damond) Wiggins. We knew they couldn’t pass that well … so we wanted to concentrate on not letting (Bryant) break off long runs.
“We worked on it a lot, and that was our key — stop the rush.”
While Terrell was figuring all that out, he also needed to find a new quarterback after losing Joseph and Joseph’s backup.
He turned to senior receiver Kevion Cornett.
“He’s one of the smartest students on our team, and he knew the offense backward and forward,” Terrell said. “He doesn’t have the arm strength of the other two quarterbacks, but as far as managing the game (and) making sure everybody’s in the right spot … we haven’t fallen off that much.”
Cornett’s first job is to deliver the ball to running back Damond Wiggins, and 6-3 wide receiver Demond Demas. Demas, a highly recruited sophomore with offers from Texas, Texas A&M and Houston.
The Rams didn’t make it easy.
Deyleon Griffith, who is also the Rams’ quarterback, intercepted Cornett on North Forest’s first possession, then tossed a 30yard scoring pass to Aqunis Green to tie the game at 12-12 early in the third quarter.
But Wiggins responded with 157 yards and three touchdowns on 19 rushes, with a 40-yard reception, Demas caught four balls for 112 yards and one score, and Derrick Graham supplied two interceptions.
“We want to maintain discipline, play hard every time out and pay attention to the fundamentals, and then carry that into the playoffs, because it’s going to get a little bit tougher,” Terrell said.
“We know that very well.”