CALEDONIA — At 5-foot-10, 175 pounds, it’s easy to overlook Louisville High School’s diminutive wide receiver Desmond Goss.
That cost the Caledonia High football team a chance to notch its first division win here Friday.
Goss, the Wildcats’ leading receiver, caught nine passes for 199 yards and two touchdowns to lead Louisville to a come-from-behind 33-13 victory in a Mississippi High School Activities Association Class 4A, Region 4 game.
“He’s our go-to guy, no doubt about it,” Louisville coach M.C. Miller said. “When it’s crunch time and we need yardage, we go to him and he gets the job done for us.”
The junior speed-burner entered the game with a team-leading 532 receiving yards, but he padded his stats with a performance that also included a 35-yard kickoff return and one carry for 5 yards.
Goss’ first touchdown, a 33-yarder, gave Louisville its initial lead (13-10) with five seconds left in the first half. His second score covered 50 yards and came less than two minutes into the third quarter to give the Wildcats a 19-10 lead.
Midway through the fourth quarter, Goss added a 63-yard reception — his longest of the season — to set up Louisville’s final touchdown, a 1-yard plunge by Cass Love.
“All three of those catches came at critical times, but that’s what we come to expect from No. 5 and he’s gotten the job done game-in and game-out,” Miller said.
Louisville amassed 395 yards total offense, only 110 of which came on the ground as quarterback Wyatt Roberts was 18 of 26 for 285 yards and three touchdowns. He was 9 of 10 in the second half.
Caledonia coach Ricky Kendrick spent most of the game lamenting the fact his secondary wasn’t up to the task.
“We just didn’t do a good job coverage-wise,” Kendrick. “We did well against the run for the most part, but we’ve got some work to do with our pass coverage, and we’ve just got to make those plays.”
In spite of the 20-point loss, Kendrick wasn’t all that displeased with his team’s effort.
“When you get down to it, we played probably the best game we’ve played against Louisville in a long, long time,” Kendrick said. “Our kids fought hard and a couple of big plays here and there and it would have been a lot closer than what it turned out.”
Kendrick said his squad was overmatched at several positions, especially with so many players — 10 at last count — out with injuries but played with great effort for most of the game.
“Louisville is one of the elite high school programs in Mississippi, and they’ve won a bunch of state championships,” Kendrick said. “They have great athletes at every position, and if you mess up, they have the talent to score on you in a heartbeat.”
Although the Confederates had only 206 yards of offense, Kendrick said they played well offensively.
“Our offensive line did a great job and Ben (Marchbanks) threw the ball well and protected it well also,” Kendrick said. “We played the dog out of them offensively and did some good things, enough that we should have been up 10-0 at halftime.”
Caledonia appeared to have things well in hand midway through the second period, but the Wildcats scored two quick touchdowns to take a 13-10 lead at the half.
A Randy Randle interception set up a 32-yard Josh Kugel field goal with less than a minute and a half left in the first quarter. Randle added an 11-yard touchdown run with 6 minutes, 29 seconds left in the second period for the 10-0 lead.
Sophomore Demarcus Brooks silenced the home crowd when he bolted 90 yards down the visitor’s sideline with the ensuing kickoff. Dalton Hudspeth added the point after to make it 10-7.
A Louisville defensive stand resulted in a Caledonia punt with less than a minute left in the half, but Roberts led the Wildcats on a 10-play, 96-yard march.
Roberts was 7 of 9 on the drive, the last of which covered 33 yards to Goss to give the Wildcats a lead they didn’t relinquish.
Goss grabbed his second TD pass less than two minutes into the third period to increase the lead to nine points, but Kugel booted a career-tying best 46-yard field goal with 4:20 left in the quarter to cut it to 19-13.
Louisville responded with a 72-yard march capped by a 15-yard TD pass from Roberts to 6-foot-4 sophomore wide receiver Dontae Jones. Offensive lineman Rodneal Smith grabbed a tipped pass for the two-point conversion and a 27-13 lead.
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