Not many people were giving the Louisville Wildcats a chance on Friday night when they hosted the state’s top team in Starkville High School. Head coach Tyrone Shorter called it a David vs. Goliath matchup as the Wildcats work break in some new talent on the offensive side of the ball and the Yellow Jackets are expected to contend for the state’s tough title in Class 6A. What happened was the Wildcats outgained SHS in every category and held a halftime lead only to give up two big plays in the second half that was the difference. The Jackets escaped with a 24-14 win, but it was not without tremendous effort from the home team. “I’m really proud of them,” Shorter said. “We have a young offense and I’m so proud of those kids. I’m proud of our receiving crew, those guys stepped up tonight. We’ve got a young backfield and the young quarterback stayed in there and took some shots but delivered the football. I told the team that if we continue to play like we did (Friday), everybody we play are 4A schools and this game let me know we have a championship football team. We just need to stay together, keep grinding and see where it takes us.” The Jackets (2-0) were missing four critical starters on defense and Shorter took advantage of it as his team rushed for 163 yards. Emory James had a big night with 14 carries for 92 yards and a touchdown. They also had a solid game from junior Jace Hudspeth at quarterback as he threw for 190 yards and a touchdown. Jarvis Rush pulled in six catches for one touchdown and Dantavius Triplett had three catches for 67. The biggest workload came from the Louisville defense as they pressured Dandy Dozen quarterback Luke Altmyer all night and made him uncomfortable. He was 13-of-20 for just 173 yards, one touchdown and one interception and was sacked three times. “I knew that we weren’t going to stop him. He’s too great of a football player and they’ve got some weapons,” Shorter said of defending Altmyer. “My hat goes off to my defensive coaches, we had a heck of a game plan against him. I thought we did a lot of things disguising a lot of coverages and stuff that gave him problems.” LHS got hit in the mouth early when they failed to score following an 83-yard kickoff return from Jaden Triplett all the way down to the Jackets’ 10 yard line. SHS got a quick score, but LHS came back with a 13-play, 85-yard drive ending with an Emory James 7-yard run. They scored again at the start of the second quarter when Hudspeth found Rush for 47 yards and they suddenly led 14-7. It was 14-10 heading into the second half when the two biggest plays of the game happened. SHS came out and got a 65-yard run by backup running back Jordan Mitchell and scored again on the next possession with a Kobe Larkin 14-yard touchdown. That would be enough for the win. “What hurt us were the two big plays in the third quarter. We had some good calls but they just made the plays,” Shorter said. “I told them that if we didn’t give up big plays we had a chance to win the football game. We gave up those two big plays and it hurt us.” As Shorter mentioned, the Wildcats got a chance to see where they are as a team against two Class 6A opponents and he believes they came out strong at 1-1. Now the rest of the way will be against teams from their own classification and they play Shannon on the road on Friday. In two weeks they’ll be ready to start Region 4 play. “Moving forward, I just like where we are right now. It’s just the second game of the season and we’re going to get better and better,” We’ve got Shannon and Yazoo City next, two teams that we probably will see in the playoffs as well so we’ve got to make a statement the next two weeks.”
