PONTOTOC — Find a way.

It sounds simple, but Jeff Carter feels those three words describe the essence of the 2016 Pontotoc High School football team.

Flavored with equal helpings of grit and determination, the Warriors have matured from a group that won three games two seasons ago to six last season.

But none of those wins compared to what Pontotoc accomplished Friday night.

Led by quarterback Jacob Carter and the playmaking ability of running back Caleb Harmon and wide receiver Austin Morphis, Pontotoc upended two-time reigning champion Noxubee County 29-20 in the Mississippi High School Activities Association Class 4A North State semifinals at Tommy Morton Field.

“This senior group got their teeth kicked in for two years because a lot of these guys played as freshmen,” coach Carter said. “They stayed with it and kept believing in each other, and they believed in us. We had a taste of it last year and it kept carrying over. Everybody stayed with it. They stayed with the weight room and with our play book.

“It is a great night for Pontotoc and the city of Pontotoc to be able to beat the defending state champions. I can’t be more pleased with a team, a staff, everybody involved. They have bought in.”

Pontotoc (13-1), which has won six games in a row, will take on Lafayette, which beat Amory 51-13 on Friday night, next week for the Class 4A North State championship. The winner of that game will play the winner of the game between Florence and Poplarville at 3 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 3, at Mississippi State’s Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville.

Noxubee County (9-5) finishes with its most losses in a season since the 2006 campaign.

Early lead for Tigers

Noxubee County looked to be on cruise control as its used touchdowns passes by Armoni Clark to build a 14-0 lead early in the second quarter. But rain and windy conditions came to stay in the second quarter and limited the Tigers’ effectiveness in the passing game.

The Tigers also had problems with penalties, including multiple defensive substitutions infractions, and the running of Harmon, a 5-foot-7 sophomore, and Carter, a senior quarterback who is the coach’s son.

To make matters worse, Noxubee County coach Tyrone Shorter lamented his team’s inability to tackle when it looked like it had plays stopped for little or no gain.

“We just made too many mistakes,” Shorter said. “We turned the ball over a couple of times and gave it to them on a short field. They are a good football team, but we just made too many mistakes. Our mistakes finally caught up with us.”

Noxubee County avoided potential disaster in the first quarter. On its second play, quarterback Maliek Stallings misfired and threw the football right to a Pontotoc player, but the ball was dropped. On the Warriors’ first possession, Carter overthrew a wide open Darryl Dilworth, who was behind the defense and likely would have scored.

The Tigers capitalized on the missed opportunities, as Clark hit Javarcus Walker on a 50-yard pass play. Clark had time to wait for Walker to come across the middle and hit him with 6 minutes, 14 seconds left in the first quarter. Samuel Lowery’s kick made it 7-0.

Noxubee County extended the lead on the next possession, as Clark hit Walker on a 43-yard pass play to set up a 24-yard touchdown pass to Kyziah Pruitt. Lowery’s kick made it 14-0.

Rain affects passing

But the rain started early in the second quarter and hurt the Tigers’ passing game. Turnovers contributed to the demise, too, as Jakerrius Oliver fumbled with less than four minutes to go in the second quarter to give the Warriors the ball in the red zone. Harmon made the Tigers pay with a 15-yard run up the middle on the first play. Carter’s kick cut the lead to 14-7 with 3 minutes, 48 seconds to go in the half.

“I thought we had our passing game going early before the rain came,” Shorter said. “I thought that hurt us a little bit when the rain came. It made us kind of one-dimensional. We couldn’t throw the ball like we wanted to.”

Penalties also worked against Noxubee County, even after an interception by Jataquist Sherrod on fourth-and-5 denied a potential tying score.

Noxubee County had a chance to add to the lead, but Ty’Quintin Ramsey was caught from behind after a 62-yard run. The drive stalled as Clark threw an incomplete pass on fourth-and-6 from the 12-yard line.

An interception by Joshua Little preserved Noxubee County’s 14-7 halftime lead.

Pontotoc finally tied the game with a little more than four minutes to go in the third quarter when Carter hit Morphis on a 26-yard touchdown pass. The play completed a wild sequence that saw Pontotoc have a touchdown pass called back due to an illegal forward pass. The penalty set up a third-and-31 from the 41, but Noxubee County was called for pass interference. The Tigers’ coaches wanted a tipped pass that would have negated the penalty. The penalty gave the Warriors another chance on third-and-16 from the 26.

Warriors seize control

Pontotoc took the lead for good on the next possession. After a 9-yard punt gave the Warriors the ball at the 30-yard line, Harmon broke two double-digit gains to set up a 38-yard run. The point after appeared to be a broken play, but the Warriors scored on the conversion pass to take a 22-14 lead.

“He is a good back,” Shorter said of Harmon. “We missed too many tackles tonight. He is a short guy and he kept driving his legs. It was just one of those nights. He is a good back and he made plays tonight.”

Noxubee County answered on the first play of the fourth quarter on a 61-yard swing pass from Stallings to Jaqualyn Smith. The run failed and left the Tigers trailing by two.

The Tigers appeared poised to take the lead after recovering a fumble on the ensuing kickoff. Stallings nearly had a pass intercepted on a holding call that set up a third-and-16 from the Warriors’ 34. Stallings then threaded the football between four defenders to Pruitt, but the sophomore fumbled at the 12 to give the ball back to the Warriors.

Noxubee County had another opportunity

following a fumble by Carter, but Tadarious McIntosh had one of his two interceptions in the quarter.

Pontotoc sealed the game on the next possession. After a sack by Antonio Roby drove the Warriors back to their 45, Morphis turned a screen pass around the right end on third-and-20 into a 55-yard touchdown with 3:37 remaining.

“We had a good play call on that screen. We had kids there, but we just missed the tackle,” Shorter said. “I think when we look back at the game film we are going to say we lost the ballgame because we missed tackles.”

Experienced group

Pontotoc has relied on a senior-laden team to deliver a season to remember for a program that is in the playoffs for the first time since 2013 and last won a division title since 2002, according to misshsfootball.com.

In 2003, Pontotoc won 10 games and lost to Noxubee County 33-7 in the second round of the Class 4A playoffs. Pontotoc, which was runner-up in 1992, has never won a state title.

But Carter, who took over from Scott Brown in January 2015, will try to change that with a team he said finds ways to get it done.

Carter, who served as a coordinator under Brown, was an All-Southeastern Conference defensive back at Ole Miss. He was named the Chucky Mullins Courage Award winner in 1991. He was a graduate assistant coach at Ole Miss (1993-94) before moving to work as a coach at Arkansas State, Tupelo High (1996-97), Northwest Mississippi Community College (1998), Itawamba C.C., and Northeast Mississippi C.C. (2010) before returning to Tupelo High (2012).

Carter’s other son, Justin, is a sophomore on the team.

Jacob was a starter as a sophomore before he suffered a knee injury. Jacob Carter, who wears a brace on his left leg, has had three knee surgeries in the last three years. In fact, he played without an anterior cruciate ligament in his left leg, but coach Carter said Jacob still finds a way to get things done. A perfect example came in the second half when Carter scrambled to his left to avoid pressure and slid in front of the Noxubee County sideline for a big gain. His brace appeared to lock up, but he didn’t flinch and tried to work the grass out of the hinges as he moved back toward the huddle.

“We just played hard,” Carter said. “I made a couple of mistakes early on. We struggled on offense in the first half and then made some corrections. We played our total best in the second half. I couldn’t ask for more from anybody. The offensive line, the coaches, the receivers, and our running backs, they played great. I give them all of the credit.”

Staying focused

Carter said Pontotoc wasn’t distracted by Noxubee County’s tradition. He said it was important for the Warriors to hit the Tigers in the mouth because they knew they were going to do that to them.

Coach Carter said the Warriors did that and made something out of nothing by relying on grit and their defense to end the Tigers’ attempt to win an unprecedented third-straight Class 4A State title.

The loss dropped the Tigers to 79-8 in the last three months of the season in the last 10 seasons.

Noxubee County nearly suffered that eighth loss last week, but it used a 50-yard touchdown pass from Maliek Stallings to Kyziah Pruitt with two minutes remaining to keep its season alive.

Pontotoc denied Noxubee County a chance to work its magic late in the game by containing the running game. The rain aided the Warriors’ cause.

“We hoped the rains would come a little bit to make them run the ball a little more and throw a lot of short passes,” Pontotoc defensive coordinator Mickey Mapp said. “We had two alignment problems on the two touchdowns and we fixed that at halftime. The kids just played unbelievably hard, got lined up right, and did the things we asked them to do.”

Mapp agreed with Jacob Carter that the Warriors played exceptionally well in the second half. He said the coaches reiterated that Pontotoc couldn’t be intimidated by Noxubee County and that it had to maintain its focus.

Coach Carter said that belief is part of the foundation the coaches have used to build the program from three to six to 13 wins.

“You had to get them believe they could win,” Carter said of the initial struggles to lay that foundation. “They just had to believe they could win regardless of who is out there on the field. They executed the game plan and believed. In the offseason, they never missed a workout. They were always here and they were committed and stayed together. We had some talent, too. When you mix that in there with that, you have pretty good chemistry on a football team.”

Carter said the Warriors don’t allow situations like 14-0 deficits or rainy conditions affect them. He said the Warriors made mistakes against the Tigers, but he was proud to see the players have the backs of their teammates and keep making plays after things went wrong.

Harmon did that by keeping his legs going on every carry. Jacob Carter did that by weaving in and out of traffic to keep plays alive. Morphis did that by reading his blocks and walking the tight rope on the sidelines to deliver some of the Warriors’ biggest scores this season.

Next week, Pontotoc will try to find a way against another one of the state’s perennial powers in Class 4A. But that won’t matter to the Warriors because they aren’t going to stop.

“We have just put it all together,” Jacob Carter said. “We’re working as a team and playing the best that we can.”

Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor

Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.