MACON — There’s nothing like an old-fashioned defensive gem to help make everyone feel good again.
While the Noxubee County High School football program has taken immense pride in having explosive offenses in the last 20 years, dominating defenses have helped the Tigers win four Mississippi High School Activities Association (MHSAA) Class 4A State championships in the last nine years.
In two of those seasons (2008, 2012), the Tigers had arguably the state’s top defenses en route to perfect seasons.
It remains to be seen whether Noxubee County’s defense this season will rank with the defenses of the past, but Noxubee County football coach Tyrone Shorter feels that unit took a major step in the right direction last week in a 34-9 victory against Columbus.
Noxubee County (1-1) regrouped from a 43-3 loss to Starkville by posting 11 sacks and limiting Columbus (0-2) to 74 yards. Sixty of those yards came on the final four plays.
“I thought our defense played really, really well,” Shorter said. “We got after the quarterback. Our defensive linemen came off the ball really well, and our linebackers played really well. Overall, we had a really good defensive stand against a young Columbus team. I would hate to see those guys in Columbus in a few years. They are going to be really tough.
“But I knew going into the game we were going to play really well. They were focused and intense at practice.”
Shorter hopes Noxubee County will be able to deliver a similar effort at 7 tonight when it goes on the road to face Shannon (1-1). This game will be a little more interesting than the first two games of the season against Class 6A opponents because Shannon is considered one of the top teams in the North in Class 4A.
Shorter said Noxubee County went back to its base-50 defense in which it brings a linebacker down in an attempt to get even more pressure on the quarterback. The move, coupled with a strong effort from the defensive line, provided a spark that helped erase some of the sting from the loss to Starkville.
“They came into the football game being aggressive,” Shorter said. “I thought we were aggressive in the first half the first week, but we weren’t in the second half. The guys stayed aggressive for the whole ballgame against Columbus. They were prepared to play.”
Shorter said the Tigers had only 44 yards rushing at halftime. Junior running back Jaqualyn Smith sparked the second-half resurgence and finished with nine carries for 119 yards.
“It’s about will,” Shorter said. “The offense is still getting used to a different system, and it is going to take a little time. We just made some adjustments. I thought our offensive coaches did a very good job making some blocking adjustments.”
Shorter said he saw signs of the turnaround last week in practice. He said nearly all of the players opted to stay late after practice to get extra reps or to do additional conditioning. Shorter said the coaches didn’t need to ask the players to do that. He said they did that because the loss to the Yellow Jackets served as a “wake-up call.”
Tonight, Shorter hopes his team will be equally focused against one team it could face again in the playoffs later in the season.
If that is to happen, Shorter said he and his coaches will have to stay on the players to make sure they maintain that will to dominate.
“We have to stay on top of our game and don’t let up on them,” Shorter said. “This game coming up is a big game. We are going to treat the game against Shannon like a playoff game because it has that type of feel to me.”
Noxubee County defeated Shannon 42-6 in the last meeting between the schools in 2012. The Tigers had five shutouts and allowed only 122 points en route to a 16-0 finish and their second state title.
Shorter said he told his players they need to maintain the intensity they showed in the game against Columbus. He feels it will be hard to beat the Tigers if they can do that and continue to cut down on their mistakes.
“I know we play some tough teams, but I have a lot of confidence in this football team,” Shorter said. “We don’t have a whole lot of depth. We have a lot of young kids, but I still like this football team no matter who we play.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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