Kris Pickle isn’t sure how his team will react tonight.
Ordinarily, any New Hope High School team would be sky high and eagerly anticipating a game against Oxford, which is one of its biggest rivals.
At 7 tonight, though, Pickle doesn’t know how the New Hope High football team will respond for its Mississippi High School Activities Association Class 5A, Region 1 matchup against Oxford. Pickle hopes the Trojans will be ready after the team and the New Hope community learned Saturday evening that a silver Toyota that ran off Highway 82 East and rolled multiple times. Four teenagers were injured in the accident. Two 17-year-old males, who are members of the school’s football team, were airlifted from the scene to North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo.
“Any time you have classmates, not just football players, but classmates that are hurt, especially in a situation when they are put in the hospital, it is going to have an impact on them,” Pickle said. “They might not it show, but it will.”
Pickle said the team’s seniors wanted to go to see their two classmates in the hospital, so Pickle and the coaches cut their Monday practice short and traveled to Tupelo. Pickle said he went to the hospital Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday to show support to the families. He said the team took the players’ jerseys to them and brought gift baskets for both of the families to help in any way possible.
Pickle said there was no discussion about not playing the game due to the accident.
“One of the parents told me you have got to do it,” Pickle said. “It is something the kids are going to have to do, and it is something he would want you to do. I think the kids would want to play for him and the other guy also. You do the best you can to get through the practice week and show up (tonight) and play football.”
New Hope (4-3, 1-2 region) is coming off a 49-34 loss to Lake Cormorant. That loss and a setback to Clarksdale have put New Hope in a must-win situation. With a victory against Center Hill and with Lewisburg and Saltillo winless in the region, New Hope is one of five teams (West Point, Oxford, Lake Cormorant, and Clarksdale) fighting for the region’s four playoff berths. New Hope has games remaining against West Point, Lewisburg, and Saltillo, so a victory tonight would help it have control of its destiny.
Pickle isn’t sure if the players will be able to use the accident as a means to come together and to do something for their missing teammates. He hopes that is the case, but he said you never can tell how young players will react.
“I am not one for ‘Win one for the Gipper’ type speech,” Pickle said. “I think things take care of themselves, but I told them it would be pretty neat to send those guys out on a high note. At the end of the day, you still have to go out there and make plays.”
Pickle said the accident is one of several setbacks the Trojans have had to overcome this season. Other injuries have depleted the team’s depth and forced other players to step into bigger roles. He said this is the first time in his coaching career that he has had to deal with a situation like this during the season. He said he had to deal with a car accident that claimed the life of a player while he was a coach at Nettleton High, but that incident came after the season.
Pickle acknowledged it has been difficult to separate the effects of the accident on those involved and having to prepare to play a very good football team. Oxford (4-3, 2-1) is coming off a 48-13 victory against Lewisburg.
“I don’t know if you can truly re-focus in and do it. You just have to do the best you can,” Pickle said. “We still put together a plan. We were sitting here Sunday and watching film, but we left (that night to go to the hospital) and we didn’t quite get finished with the plan Sunday.
“Looking at a situation like (the accident) it kind of puts it in perspective for you. … I think we all get caught up so much in I have to do whatever it takes to win football, baseball, or basketball games. I think we all forget the most important team thing, which is to help develop the kids. As a coach, as a staff, and as a school, that is the business we are in, and teaching kids how to be successful and how to be adults.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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