Starkville High football’s margin for error became significantly slimmer with a loss at Germantown last week in the district opener. The Yellow Jackets (5-2) must take care of business Friday against Clinton to improve their playoff positioning.

Courtland Cooper and Jay Stevenson each ran for a pair of touchdowns in the defeat, but Starkville could not string together enough defensive stops and missed two key extra points. The Mavericks scored the eventual game-winning touchdown with less than two minutes remaining, then intercepted Jackets quarterback Trey Petty in the final minute to send Starkville to a 34-33 loss.

“We didn’t get any stops. We didn’t stop the run game,” Jackets head coach Chris Jones said. “That’s the main focus for this week. We have a lot of young guys on defense. They’re playing hard, but they’re making mistakes, so hopefully we can fix up those mistakes and continue to get better.”

Starkville is led by the dynamic duo of Petty, an Illinois commit, and four-star receiver Braylon Burnside, who is committed to Mississippi State. Jones, though, credited his offensive line for allowing those playmakers and the Jackets’ running backs to pick up big chunks of yardage. Jones also highlighted two-way lineman Charles Woodard for his work on the defensive end.

The loss to Germantown dropped Starkville from No. 4 all the way down to No. 13 in the MaxPreps state rankings. The Jackets opened the season with quality wins over Golden Triangle rivals Noxubee County and West Point, and they have a combined margin of defeat of five points in their two defeats.

“We still have a lot of football left,” Jones said. “We just have to make a few adjustments and see if that will work going into this game. This is a big week. We need to get this win.”

Starkville will be heavily favored to do just that against the Arrows (1-5), who got in the win column themselves for the first time last week with a victory over Terry. The teams have played each other every year since 2013 including a 2015 postseason meeting, with the Jackets holding an 8-3 edge in that span. Clinton, though, has won two of the last three, handing Starkville a 35-28 loss last fall.

“First and foremost, we have to stop the run,” Jones said. “We have to win the battle in the trenches. Offensively, we have to take care of the football. When we get chances in the red zone to score, we have to score touchdowns. We’ll try to be good in all three phases of the game.”