The goal of every successful high school football program is to go undefeated on the season. It’s an achievement very few teams have pulled off.
If a high school team goes undefeated, it is even rarer for that squad not to allow a point. It’s the dream of every defensive coordinator and the daily double of prep football, so to speak.
Tonight, just such an accomplishment will be celebrated, as members of the 1977 unbeaten, unscored upon Hamilton High School football team will be honored prior to the Hamilton-Hatley contest.
Coached by the legendary Jimmie Moore, who never had a losing season at Hamilton, the 1977 squad finished 10-0. More impressively, not one of the Lions’ opponents scored a touchdown, kicked a field goal or posted a safety.
Tony Robinson, who is one of the best players to come through the storied Hamilton program, was a volunteer coach for the 1977 team. He calls the Lions’ achievement a very “unique” accomplishment.
“Going undefeated was pretty special, but not allowing a single point to be scored all year was what I would call phenomenal,” said Robinson, who signed with the University of Mississippi following a standout career with the Lions. “No doubt about it, it was a very unique season.”
Robinson, who claims he had very little to do with the team’s success as an assistant coach, was on the sideline only because Moore asked him to volunteer.
“Coach Moore was my high school coach, my mentor, and a tremendous friend who I have always looked up to, and when he asked me to help, there was no way I could refuse,” said Robinson, who had just returned to Hamilton to enter the farming business after shoulder and knee injuries cut short his Ole Miss career. “But I wouldn’t call what I did coaching by any stretch of the imagination. The main man responsible for us being unbeaten and unscored on was Jimmie Moore. That, combined with some good coaching from the real assistants (Wilkins Raybon and Johnny Noe) and a lot of hard work by the players, was what drove that team to be as successful as it was.”
Johnny Corbell, who started at quarterback as a sophomore and also doubled as a strong safety, credits senior leadership and a close-knit group of players for the team’s impressive accomplishments.
“Seniors like King David Rush, Ollie B. Keaton, Steve Oliver, and Ronald Jones, among others, kept us focused,” Corbell said. “With coach Moore, you better stay focused, but the seniors really provided us younger players with the leadership we needed.
“As a team, we really stuck together, both on the field and off the field, and that allowed us to develop a team chemistry, which helped us remain close all during the season.”
Rush, who was the linchpin of that stingy defensive unit, has fond memories of the 1977 season. He went on to have an outstanding career as a linebacker at Jackson State, and is the superintendent of the Indianola School District.
“When I look back on that part of my life and tell people we not only went undefeated, but unscored too, they don’t believe it,” Rush said. “And to tell you the truth, if I live to be 100, I’ll have a hard time believing we did it, too. Over the years, it has taken on a life of its own, and it has become almost bigger than life, especially since most of who started on defense also started on offense.
“That aside, what I remember the most is playing with a great group of guys for a coach I considered to be the best motivator anywhere who had us prepared to play and who had us convinced we could beat any team we played.”
Lost in all the hoopla over being unscored upon in 1977 was the fact Hamilton didn’t give up a point for 18 straight games over the course of three seasons. In 1976, the Lions’ only loss was a 23-12 setback to archrival New Hope in the second game of the year. The following week, Hamilton slipped by Mooreville 14-8. The Troopers proved to be the last team to dent the scoreboard, as the Lions shut out their next seven opponents to finish 9-1 in ’76.
After 10 shutouts in ’77, Hamilton opened the 1978 season with a 6-0 win against Caledonia, but nemesis New Hope stopped the unscored upon streak at 18 games with a 20-20 tie in the Lions’ second game of the year.
Hamilton outscored its opponents 673-0, 375-0 in 1977, in that 18-game span.
“My friends have a hard time believing we went a whole season without giving up a point,” Rush said. “But when I tell them we did the same thing the last seven games of the previous season, they think I’m just making it up.”
Despite the high-scoring antics in which the 1977 squad averaged 37.5 points per game and scored more than 48 points the final five games of the season, it was the defense that will be remembered for whitewashing 10 straight opponents.
“Don’t get me wrong, coach Moore loved to score points,” Robinson said. “But he also stressed the defensive side of the game as much as he did offense and he took great pride in shutting out an opponent. He’d beat you anyway he could, whether it was playing one-on-one basketball or checkers, but he always reinforced the fact that if the other team didn’t score, the game couldn’t be lost.”
Robinson and Corbell agreed the team was aware of the scoreless streak, but it wasn’t something that was discussed all that much in practice or during the games.
“What I do remember was we did call ourselves the ‘Blue Steel’ defense, kind of like the ‘Steel Curtain’ defense of the Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers’ teams of the ’70s,” said Corbell, who also went into coaching after moving to Louisiana. “I want to say King David (Rush) came up with the nickname, but I’m not really sure.”
Robinson said he doesn’t remember Moore or the players putting a great deal of emphasis on the streak, either.
“Maybe towards the end of the year, it might have been brought up and maybe the players talked about it among themselves, but coach Moore wouldn’t have allowed the players to get all caught up in something like that,” Robinson said.
“His focus was always on preparation and getting the most out of his players, and believe me, he got us prepared for every opponent, and he got the most out of us anyone could have. I can’t tell you how many times he hit me on my helmet with that whistle of his when I played for him. It’s a wonder it (the whistle) even worked.”
Corbell said he only remembers two times when the 1977 “streak” was in jeopardy – in the fifth game of the year against Hatley and again later in the season.
“In the Hatley game, I think they broke a long run on us and got down inside the 20,” Corbell said. “We were up (34-0) late in the game, but not in the last seconds or so, and I remember Hatley lined up and tried to kick a field goal on second down just to try to score some points.”
Hatley also came into the game unbeaten at 4-0, unscored upon and had out-pointed its opponents 104-0.
Later in the season, Corbell said Tishomingo or Belmont kicked off to Hamilton to start the half and the ball was recovered by the Lions inside their 1-yard line.
“Someone kicked off to us and for some reason we couldn’t get a handle on it,” Corbell said. “The ball rolled around before Tim Fields fell on it inside the 1. Had the other team recovered the ball, it wouldn’t have taken but less than a yard for them to score a touchdown and the scoreless streak would have been history.”
The 1977 team members included Tim Ellis, Johnny Corbell, Mickey Sanders, Tim Fields, George Whitfield, Ricky Thompson, Wardell Trimble, Robert Harris, Jessie Wilson, Travis English, Patrick Hogan, Danny Burnett, Vince Gilliland, Leon Smith, Robert Wardlaw, Randy Hamilton, Terry Welch, Wayne Davis, Henry Moton, Steve Smith, Ollie Keaton, Claude Cantrell, Doug Rea, King David Rush, Timothy Trimble, Johnny Helton, Steve Oliver, Godfrey Hollivay, Ronald Jones, Jerry Trimble, and Donnie Reeves.
Post-season first-team 1977 All-Waterway Conference honorees included Helton, Oliver, Rush, Keaton and Corbell. Second team recogni
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