By Angie Ledbetter

After edging past Tupelo last week the No. 2 South Panola Tigers (8-1) will travel tonight to take on the Southaven Chargers (5-4) in district action.

“I’m really proud of homecoming and I thought we had a really great crowd,” said Head Coach Lance Pogue. “We were glad to win the game but we didn’t play perfect by any means. I think it’s kind of a tribute sometimes when you don’t play the best game you find a way to win and we did that. We won and move on to the next one and that’s the positive thing.”

With the Tupelo game Pogue said they had great intentions.

“It’s not like it’s an exact science with emotions, intensity and those kinds of things. It doesn’t always work out the way you want but you just find a way to fight through all of that and overcome it.”

South Panola leads the 6A Region 1 District with a 4-0 record, followed by three teams with 3-1 records, Tupelo, Grenada and Desoto Central; Olive Branch 2-2, Southaven 1-3, and two 0-4 teams, Horn Lake and Hernando.  

“It’s big being undefeated in the district because no one else is undefeated. We’ve put ourselves in great position but we’ve just got to continue to take each step a week at a time. Every time you win another one it puts you one step closer,” Pogue said.

SP vs Southaven

Southaven started the season defeating Clarksdale 42-7. They went across the state line to Memphis for their next two games.  The Chargers edged past Trezevant 17-14 and Christian Brothers 45-42. They took their first loss of the season when the Starkville Yellowjackets beat them 34-14 on September 13. The following week the Chargers went back to Memphis to take on Mitchell High School and won 31-13. 

Southaven entered the district with a 4-1 overall record but fell to Olive Branch 49-12 on September 27. They defeated Hernando 48-20 the next week. The last two weeks they have fallen to Tupelo 26-13 and Grenada 35-14. 

Pogue said Southaven has played some really good teams in the district so far with Olive Branch, Tupelo and Grenada. 

Points wise the Chargers have been outscored 240-236 in the nine games. 

Since Pogue has been at South Panola the Tigers have defeated the Chargers every year outscoring them 229-88 in six seasons.

Last year was the closest score between the two teams, a 35-33 win by South Panola. 

Pogue said through the years Southaven has always been a thorn in their side. 

“They’ve always played us tough and there’s been some times when it was really close in the first half and things like that.  It’s just one of those teams that have always played us hard. They’re struggling a little this year but I know we’ll get their best.

“They’ll come in with nothing to lose and that’s always a dangerous team,” Pogue said. “I’m really concerned with our approach with being 4-0 in the division. Each time you win another one you get one step closer to getting that number one seed and I think our guys understand that. Our challenge is to come out and try to play at our best and keep improving.” 

Leading the Chargers is senior quarterback, No. 12, Shea Chism a 6’2”, 190 pounds. 

At running back are No. 7 Rickey May and No. 8 Terence Davis Jr.

Southaven’s defense has struggled this year, according to Pogue.

“They use a lot of different people to try to mix and match. Against Tupelo they played really well and looks like they’re getting a little bit better.”

Southaven is mostly a throwing team.

“Southaven is throwing the ball a heavy percentage of the time and we fully expect them to throw it a lot against us.” 

WBLE FM 100.5 will carry the game with pregame at 6 p.m. The games will be audio streamed on www.wble101.com and video streamed at www.sptigerden.com or through www.panolian.com and click on the South Panola Tiger Den live stream link in the top right corner.

Fans may also download the new South Panola High School app located in the app store on most smartphones.