Bay Springs head football coach Dan Brady will get one more chance this year to lead a team onto the field, and the seventh year Bulldogs’ skipper is just as excited as if it were the first game of the season. However, this time it won’t be Bay Springs he will be directing; it will be a group of highly talented senior athletes from all across south Mississippi that have been selected for the Bernard Blackwell North/South All-Star Game.
Brady was chosen as the head coach of the South All-Stars that will take the field Saturday against the North All-Stars.
“It feels good to be able to get back on the football field, especially with all the turmoil from COVID and having to miss so many games during the season. It just feels good to be able to coach again,” he explained Tuesday afternoon just following the South All-Stars’ first practice.
Brady’s Bulldogs team was forced to miss four games this season due to COVID and even went on a month-long stretch without touching the practice field at one point, before finally getting back on game playing track and eventually falling in the first round 2A playoffs at Wesson.
“I got to take one of my players (Nick Agee) as an All-Star, and it feels good to be able to coach him one more time. It’s just awesome to be able to coach,” he said. “Sometimes we take for granted just being able to coach another game, and I think this year more than any other year that really got put into perspective. I’m excited and blessed to be able to coach another game.”
Along with Agee, Brady said the South team is full of gifted players all the way from the 1A ranks to 6A from south Mississippi, especially the Pine Belt area. He mentioned the upcoming All-Star game is a “fun time” for the players and coaches, and is a great time for players to showcase their talents to possible college recruiters. But, he also stressed his and his newly met team’s desire to walk off the field with a win.
“I think we’ve got a really good group - some big time players from right here in the local area, too. We were able to take Nick Agee, one of our players at Bay Springs, Margro Perkins from Raleigh, (Kristian) Milsap from Enterprise, and quarterback Allen Follis from West Jones. We were able to take a lot of local kids, and the south in my opinion, is just really strong this year. We’ve got kids as far south as the Gulf Coast and as far north as Velma Jackson in Camden, Mississippi. We’ve got a really good representation of kids,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of good kids, a lot of very talented kids, and a lot of very coachable kids. After the first day of practice, I am really impressed with Robert Henry from Lumberton. I feel good. I feel like we are going to have a good shot to win on Saturday. The kids are working hard, and I think we are going to get it done. We have talked to the kids, and we are here to win. We want to have a good time and get some kids noticed, but at the end of the day we are here to compete, get better each day, and we want to win the ballgame.”
The Bernard Blackwell North/South All-Star Game is set to kick off at 1:30 p.m. this Saturday, December 19, at Brandon High School.
