Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
FORT SMITH SOUTHSIDE MAVERICKS
2017 RECORD 3-8, 2-5 7A-Central COACH Jeff Williams
RETURNING STARTERS 8 offense, 8 defense
KEY PLAYERS QB Taye Gatewood (Sr., 5-11, 210), WR Tyrese Solomon (Sr., 5-11, 170), LB Darin Davenport (Sr., 6-2, 225), WR Jordyn Jackson (Sr., 5-11, 170), DB DeDe Smith (Sr., 6-3, 150), RB Ricardo Savoy (Sr., 5-10, 160).
THE SKINNY The Mavericks were an uncharacteristic 3-8 last season, but return almost all their starters including stellar QB Taye Gatewood and WR Tyrese Solomon. … Southside’s slide last season could be traced back to a pair of narrow back-to-back losses to Conway (54-47 OT) and 43-41 to Cabot. … Injuries were a big factor as LB Darin Davenport missed the entire season. Despite playing just a handful of snaps the past two seasons, Davenport is still drawing Division I attention. … Gatewood is also drawing a lot of college interest after completing 174 of 292 passes for 2,984 yards and 26 TDs. … Solomon was Gatewood’s primary target with 65 catches for 1,211 yards. … Coach Jeff Williams believes the team’s biggest improvement will be on defense in 2018. … Williams is eight wins away from his 100th win at Southside.
COACH SPEAK “This league we’re in is really, really tough, but we feel good with the nucleus we have,. We have our quarterback back and our bell cow on defense, Darin Davenport is healthy. We scored a lot of points last year, we were in a lot of close games … a lot of games we had an opportunity to win. I think the problem was we were inexperienced and not used to being in those types of situations. This year we are a senior-based team with a pretty good sophomore class.” — Chip Souza • @nwachip