Jackets receive jolt from Jaguars
MADISON – A bye week last week got a strong Starkville High School football team already stronger from a health standpoint and the Yellow Jackets going up against a Madison Central team riddled with injuries.
The Jaguars entered the night playing a sophomore quarterback against a rejuvenated Starkville defense that smelled blood in the water. With Luke Altmyer and company fresh off of two dominating Class 6A, Region 2 wins, the Jackets were the obvious favorites.
Game night played out much differently.
SHS was stymied on offense and the defense was blown off the football in the second half. It all spelt out an upset as Madison Central came away with a 15-9 victory to get back in the region race.
“I didn’t do a good enough job preparing them for this game,” SHS head coach Chris Jones said. “I didn’t coach well enough. We didn’t execute enough. We’ve just got to get better and we will get better. I’ll take all the blame. At the end of the day, I’ve got to do better than this.”
It was a game that shifted greatly in the second half as the Jackets struggled all game on offense. The defense surrendered just one big drive in the first half in what was a dominating two quarters, but it changed in the second.
The Jaguars (5-2, 2-1 Region 2) put together an exhausting opening drive in the third quarter of more than 7 minutes. SHS ended up forcing a missed field goal, but the damage had been done and the blueprint was set for what would be the gameclinching drives ahead.
There was a glimmer of hope for the Jackets in the fourth quarter when a snap over the head of quarterback Vic Sutton was recovered by Ahmir Taylor at the Madison Central 33. Altmyer went for a big play immediately and hit Leroy Hollingshed to the 4-yard-line, but the Jackets stalled and had to kick a field goal which was good from 26 yards by Joshua Eaves.
As they had done most of the second half, though, the Jaguars drove it right down the field. Running back Jackson Mize set the table with a nice return past midfield and Sutton capped a drive with a 10-yard score for the gamewinning run with under 5 minutes left.
SHS turned the ball over on downs on the next posses
sion and couldn’t get a stop on two third down opportunities that would have given the Jackets the ball back. The second half adjustments by Madison Central proved to be critical.
“I think they found the outside zone and capitalized,” Jacket linebacker Keyshawn Lawrence said. “They were beating us at the line of scrimmage and the linebackers weren’t reading our keys. Coach Jones told us to come out hard and we came out hard. In the second half, they changed it up and found something they were good at.”
Starkville had its biggest struggle of the year on Friday on offense as it managed 252 yards of offense and just 25 on the ground on 20 carries. The offensive line couldn’t open holes and the Jackets struggled to protect Altmyer at times also.
Altmyer still had a solid game going 19-of-29 for 227 yards and one touchdown but was sacked four times and had negative 2 yards rushing. Kobe Larkin had six catches for 63 yards, Stacy Robinson had five catches for 64 yards, Sam Hunt had three catches for 38 yards and the team’s lone touchdown in the second quarter. Hollingshed finished with two catches for 53 yards.
Ronnie Randle and Lawrence both had big nights with 23 combined tackles and 4.5 tackles for loss, but neither was allowed to get in the backfield much in the second half.
It’s now back to the drawing board for Jones whose team enters yet another bye week at 6-1 and 3-1 in Region 2 play. Thanks to cancellations by teams, Jones has been put in a situation that he doesn’t want to be in with no games played but the Jackets will have to adjust.
“I’m not a fan of bye weeks, but you control what you can,” Jones said. “That’s no excuse to come out and play like this. We just didn’t play well enough and I’ve got to do a better job making sure they’re ready to play. This falls on me. I don’t want (the players) pointing fingers at each other. Point all the fingers at me.”