By Heath Walley
Friday night’s contest against Northeast Jones was one that Bay Springs head coach Dan Brady and his team wanted after suffering a close loss to the Tigers last season. The Bulldogs got the job done at home, whipping the Tigers 34-17.
Northeast received dose after dose of a Bay Springs rushing trio – Jamarius Hosey, Anson Windham, and Dallen Jones – after going into the half knotted at 14 until they could take no more. Brady was pleased with most aspects of his team’s effort on the field, but letting Northeast creep back into the game, after Bay Springs went up 14-0 early in the first quarter, was something he said his team has to work on.
“When you go down and score really quick like we did, it’s just human nature to take your foot off the gas a little bit. We got really lax,” he said. “Coming out of halftime, they understood the things they were doing, and we made some corrections as a coaching staff on both sides of the ball. The second half was on them. We told them what we expected and what is supposed to happen when you have a senior-laden team. They are supposed to come out in the second half, fix mistakes from the first half, and they got the job done.”
Bay Springs popped Northeast quickly with two touchdowns in the first quarter. On the opening drive of the game, the Bulldogs capped a 68-yard drive when quarterback Adrian Cole connected with Jacorrio Ducksworth on a 25-yard touchdown pass. Ducksworth hit the extra point, and the Bulldogs led 7-0 with 7:49 left in the first quarter. The Bay Springs defense forced Northeast to punt on its opening possession, and the Bulldogs went right back to work and picked up another touchdown. Windham and Hosey led the Bulldogs down field, and Windham polished off the drive with a 6-yard touchdown run with 3:18 left in the first.
Northeast, later in the first half, found some avenues to run, and quarterback Mason Smith put the first points of the night for the Tigers on the scoreboard with a 37-yard run to cut the lead to 14-7.
The Bay Springs offense couldn’t sustain a good drive on the next possession, and Northeast took advantage when Smith hit Jay Jones on a 12-yard strike to even the score 14-14 at the half.
The Bulldogs, looking more crisp offensively at the beginning of the second half after a Northeast turnover, drove 69 yards in only a matter of minutes. Jamarius Hosey finished the drive with a 31-yard run, dragging Tigers most of the way, to cushion the Bulldogs’ lead 20-14.
Jacorrio Ducksworth showed up again a few minutes later after the Bay Springs defense stalled a Northeast drive and forced a punt. Ducksworth made a few moves, broke several tackles, and returned the punt 85-yards for his second touchdown of the night to give the Bulldogs some real breathing room, 28-14, after a successful two-point conversion.
“’Duck’ is just one of those kids. He’s one of the best athletes on the field for us, if not the best. He can do so many things,” Brady said of his senior do-it-all. “What people don’t know about ‘Duck’ is he can play quarterback, receiver, running back, defensive back; he can do anything for us. It was really good to see him have some success tonight, and I’m happy for him. He deserves it.”
Northeast managed a late score when Jason Garcia pumped a 27-yard field goal through, but that was as close as the Tigers could get.
Later in the fourth quarter, Bay Springs put the game out of reach when Dallen Jones capped a 44-yard drive with a 6-yard touchdown run.
The Bulldogs finished with 304 total yards against Northeast, with 234 on the ground. Windham carried for 125 yards, and Hosey finished with 81 yards on the ground. Cole was 4-of-8 through the air for 70 yards. Ducksworth caught 3 passes worth 64 yards.
Northeast was limited to 248 yards. Petyon Pickens (8 solo tackles/sack) and Fred Barnes (7 solo tackles/sack) led the Bay Springs defensive charge.
Bay Springs (4-1) will now prepare for a road game at Quitman (2-3), and Brady would like to see his team clean up some things and get better at the things he says “Bay Springs does.”
“You know, Quitman is a really good football team. We aren’t going to sneak up on them, and we have to come to play the entire night like we did in the second half tonight,” he explained. “We are going to work on what we do, and if we get better at what we do, we are going to be fine. Right now, the things that are hurting us is we are not executing our stuff. Northeast Jones did a great job preparing for us. They took advantage of some things we were doing, and that’s a credit to coach (Keith) Braddock and his staff. We’ve just got to get on the right page as a unit.”
