South Panola always ‘we’ — no room for naysayers here

The South Panola Tigers, the mighty, ten-time state champions and 2010 national champions, lose to the MUS Owls! Coach Pogue needs to be fired immediately! The players have gotten too big-headed! Why didn’t they postpone the game because of the nasty weather like Olive Branch and some other area high schools did?

Those are just some of the stupid things that were heard in this area from the time the clock showed zero Friday night and all this weekend. We will hear it up until the Tigers’ game tonight against Horn Lake; that is, unless we lose again.

Just like Coach Pogue stated in Tuesday’s edition of this paper, “We are not interested in what the negative, across-the-fences coaches have to say.” He could not have been more plain and simple.

When South Panola wins, those negative people go around saying, “We won last night!”
But when South Panola loses, those same people say, “They are so sorry; they ain’t going to win no state title.”

Like most South Panola fans, I am not one of these people. South Panola will always be “we” as far as I am concerned, and as for as the remainder of this article, I will refer to South Panola as “we.”

We have been a dominant team for a long time. And we still are. Deshea Townsend, Johnny Jones, Otis Cooper and Dewayne Rudd along with Coach Willis Wright led us to our first state title in 1993. That’s 20 years ago. And we have won nine more state titles and one national title since then.

And who won that national title as head coach?

The over-criticized Coach Pogue, that’s who!

And he won two of those state championships. We should start giving this coach the credit he deserves, and we should start appreciating all of our players for the efforts they put forward each week on that gridiron.

After all, just like college athletes, they are students and football is just another subject they are taking.

Yeah, they have been on top for a long time. No one can win every game. If we are supposed to win every game, why do the opponents bother to show up? They want to win also. When a team plays us, it is like playing the title game to them.

For example, in the NBA, everyone wants to beat the Miami Heat. They are hated by other teams because they are so talented and they back it up.

Tupelo, Horn Lake, Olive Branch, Oxford, Moss Point and Southaven all hate the name South Panola. While these teams put out 100 percent effort against other opponents, they put out 200 percent against us. We get everyone’s best effort, even from out-of-state teams like MUS and North Little Rock. We are nationally recognized, talked about on the worldwide leader, ESPN, and that makes those teams jealous.

Our high school students won’t win every game, but Darrel Henderson, Rip Kirk, Oluwain Hoskins, Brady Smith, Roosevelt Jones along with their teammates are trying to win every game.

Coach Pogue is a good coach, but he’s not perfect. He can’t win the championship every year.
Back to the NBA: the greatest player of all time won six championships, so nine of those seasons he came up empty.

In football, Dan Marino quarterbacked the Miami Dolphins for 17 seasons. He is one of the top five quarterbacks of all time. How many Super Bowls did he play in? One. How many did he win? Less than one.

In preseason, everyone gave the 49ers the next Super Bowl. After three weeks they are 1-2. The New York Giants and the Pittsburgh Steelers have combined to win four of the last eight Super Bowls. After three weeks their combined record is 0-6.

My point is — not saying our team is falling — but no one stays on top forever. And one of these years we might have an under-.500 record.

But if you are a true Tiger, you still will be behind our boys. Go to the games or listen on the radio or watch on the computer. And if we lose another game, don’t act like it’s the end of the world and start bad-mouthing the coach.

My personal greeting on my cell phone voice mailbox starts off saying, “You have reached the voice mail of Six-9, the number one South Panola Tiger fan.”

And if we go 0-10 for the next five years, I won’t change my voicemail personal greeting!