For the past three seasons, Eupora has been able to come away with a victory against Water Valley.
But that wasn’t the case this past Friday as the Blue Devils pulled away with a 34-8 win over the Eagles in the season opener for both teams.
Eupora coach Stephen Edwards said the Blue Devils used their depth to wear down the Eagles.
“They were just better and more experienced than us,” Edwards said. “Their right guard was a powerlifting champion in his division and the right tackle won powerlifting in his division. And those dudes came off the ball with bad intentions. They have a couple of players that are going to play some college football. It’s one of their better football teams. We have to improve on us. We have to go back to work and get better at us.”
On their second drive, Water Valley drove the ball to the Eupora 25 but turned the ball over on downs. A short punt by Eupora gave Water Valley back the ball at the 25. Four plays later, the Blue Devils scored on a 2-yard run and led 6-0 with 11:17 left in the first half.
After a Eupora three-and-out, Water Valley went 49 yards in six plays, scoring on an 8-yard run with 8:22 left in the half for a 13-0 lead that stood until the half.
The Eagles got an interception by Camron Culpepper to start the half but couldn’t convert as they were forced to punt.
Water Valley then drove 55 yards in nine plays and scored on a 20-yard run with 3:17 left in the third period to take a 20-0 lead.
“They are a real good football team and will make some noise in Class 3A,” Edwards said. “We have got some new faces out there and have some work to do. We have to coach them up on both sides of the football and special teams as well. We have to fix ourselves as best we can. We just have to get better in every phase of the game.”
Eupora responded with a five-play, 59-yard drive in which Preston Perkins scored on a 1-yard plunge. Tra McCombs had runs of 14 and 30 yards on the drive to set up the score. Day Day Brown scored on the two-point conversion to cut the lead to 20-8.
But Water Valley was having nothing of a comeback as they scored with 17.3 seconds left in the third to go up 27-8 and added another fourth-quarter score to make it 27-8.
McCombs led Eupora in rushing with 57 yards on 12 carries while Edwin Herard had 56 yards on 12 carries.
Makyrus Potts led the Eupora defense with 15 total tackles while Abraham Hodges had eight tackles and Zak Morris added seven stops. Travon McMillian had six tackles while Preston Perkins had five tackles and a sack.
The Eagles will go on the road again as they travel to Newton to take on the Tigers, who lost 35-22 to Madison St. Joseph in their season opener.
“I think it’s going to be a tough game,” Edwards said. “They have the quarterback who really hurt us last year. He played receiver in their first game but I wouldn’t be surprised if he was back at quarterback this week. Playing on the road is tough but if you want to compete for a division title, you have to play in a hostile environment at some point. I think road games like this get you ready for that.”
Last year, Newton beat Eupora 24-19
