Tigers fall to 1-1 after big loss at Brandon

By Brad Greer
The law of averages seemed to have caught up with South Panola after getting thumped 37-6 Friday night at Brandon.
Having forced three turnovers in last week’s victory over Clinton, the Tigers coughed up the ball four times and found themselves trailing 23-0 at halftime to a fired up Brandon squad who christened its new multi-million stadium.
From the ear-popping jumbotron to the inflatable Bulldog head team ran through during pre-game, the contest belonged to Brandon from the opening kickoff.
“Tonight just wasn’t our night,” said Tiger head coach Ricky Woods afterwords.
“We got behind early on and everything seemed to just snowball from there. We put together a pretty good opening drive and then fumbled inside their 30- yard line then in the second quarter we got call for a chop block that stalled a drive. That could have been 14 points right there, but you can’t turn the ball over four times and expect to win especially in 6A football,” said Woods.
Brandon(1-1) took the opening kickoff and drove 57 yards on four plays as quarterback Will Rogers connected with Bo Whatley on a 25-yard scoring strike with 8:12 left in the first quarter.
South Panola strung together four consecutive first downs on its initial series with before fumbling on the Bulldog 32.
The second Tiger possession started with promise when Patrick Shegog hit Kanoda Lewis on a 40-yard pass reception to the Brandon 21, but a personal foul penalty and a sack followed by a interception thwarted a scoring opportunity.
Brandon increased their lead to 10-0 as the second quarter got underway on Scott Goodman’s 50-yard field goal to cap off a 12-play; 58-yard drive.
South Panola (1-1) squandered another scoring chance after Wade Thornton recovered a muffed punt at midfield only to have the drive stall at the Brandon 41 yard-line.
The Bulldogs tacked on another touchdown at the 4:50 mark with Matt Stowers hauling in a 19-yard strike from Rogers to make the score 17-0 following Goodman’s point after.
Brandon essentially put the game away with less than three minutes remaining before halftime when Dakkara Shoto pounced on a muffed punt in the endzone for a 23-0 lead after a failed extra point attempt.
South Panola avoided the shutout with 5:43 remaining in the third quarter on Quin Bradford’s three-yard scoring run with the two-point conversion failing. Bradford led South Panola in rushing with 90 yards on 18 carries.
The Tigers rushed 41 times for 176 yards while gaining 94 yards through the air. Derrick Cunningham added 10 carries for 51 yards followed by Shegog with 13 carries for 35 yards, but was sacked five times.
Brandon tacked on two touchdowns in the fourth quarter as Javarius Spann crashed in from two yards out while Colby Cooper intercepted a Shegog passed and walked into the endzone for a 25-yard return.
Shegog finished the night 7-of-18 passing for 94 yards and two interceptions. Barry Flowers caught three passes for 27 yards. John Railey had two receptions for 21 yards while Jordan Strong caught one pass for six yards. Morris House recorded an interception for the Tiger defense.
“This was no indacation how far apart these two teams are. They are not 31 points better than us, take nothing away from Brandon because they were the better team tonight, but we stopped ourselves on a few drives. We’ll learn from this game and move on. There is a long season left and we’ve got ten games left to play and hopefully more than that. But we are going be just fine,” said Woods.
Brandon out-gained South Panola 307- 270 in total yardage.
The Tigers will look the get back on track as they end a three game road trip by taking on T.L. Weston Friday in Greenville.