In high school football last week, West Point’s defense stood tall against a region foe while Noxubee made just enough plays to win a close one against Choctaw County. In Caledonia, the Cavs’ offense couldn’t stack enough points to snag a region win over Pontotoc.

West Point 41, Lafayette 6

In Friday’s beatdown of Region 1-5A foe Lafayette, West Point head coach Brett Morgan could have chosen any player in his backfield to sing the praises of after his team hung 41 points on a conference foe – but it was the Green Wave’s defense that really stood out to him.

The Commodores used a total of eight different ball carriers against West Point in their Wing-T offense and all of them were stifled for a combined 85 yards. Coming into the game, Lafayette was averaging 24.5 points per contest and the Green Wave held them to just two field goals, one in the first quarter and one in the second. When the third quarter began, and West Point was up 21-6, that’s when its vaunted defense really came alive.

“The defense had kind of settled in and gotten used to the speed of their offense and the speed in which they operate, and they didn’t allow another point all night,” Morgan said.

It was the first time all season the Commodores’ offense didn’t score at least six points in the first quarter. And on the other side, West Point’s offense picked up where it left off last week and combined to rush for 236 yards and four touchdowns. Quintin Thompson led the team with 100 yards and touchdown on 11 carries, Jaylen Hall had 88 yards on six carries for a score, Kingston Branham had 56 yards on seven carries for a score and Michael Williams posted 43 yards on five totes for a touchdown. Quarterback Colt Whitacre also got the Green Wave onto the scoreboard through the air with a touchdown pass to Justin White. West Point took a 7-3 lead to the second quarter, where it outscored Lafayette 14-3 heading into the break. Two more scores in the third and one last touchdown in the fourth put the final touches on the game.

“I was very pleased. I thought we were clean in all phases, offense, defense and special teams. We did some good things. We blocked a punt, we were better on kickoff, our field goal (and) extra point was better. So some stuff that we’ve been focusing on getting better I thought we got better at.”

West Point (7-0, 2-0) is confident in running the ball, something they’ve been able to do on everybody they’ve played this season, and they are trying to mix in the throwing game as well to bring some extra levels of pressure that opposing defenses have to attend to.

“We have really grown in the passing game in the last, probably, three weeks,” Morgan said. “We’ve really been able to kind of help our offense and help our team by hitting some shots and plays downfield, so we’re working hard on that and it’s good to see that show up, because those guys work really hard. Our wideouts and our tight ends and quarterbacks spend a lot of time on that to be able to help our run game, and it’s kind of how we can get to expand those scores and get to 40 points rather than pounding our head against the wall and scoring 21 or 28. It’s critical for our offense to be able to throw the ball and help our team when the opportunity comes.”

Up next for West Point is a region game on Friday at Caledonia.

Noxubee County 8, Choctaw County 7

Sometimes in football, good things happen in moments that look like a complete disaster.

It’s a rare occasion on the gridiron when success comes from mishap, but each time it happens it always leaves both sides shocked – just one team is a little bit more excited than the other when all the dust finally settles. On Friday, Noxubee County was the team who pulled something out of nothing in a tight victory over the Chargers.

Jadien Taylor snagged a much-needed touchdown pass in the middle of the third quarter to bring his team an extra point away from a game tied at 7-7 after what had been a defensive battle. Head coach Teddy Young sent out the kicking squad with Taylor as the holder for the PAT, but the snap missed its mark and Taylor had to scramble for the ball and find something to do with it. He grabbed the ball and juked and cut around defenders to buy time and fired what became a game-winning 2-point conversion pass to Cameron Chandler.

In the moment, Young said he was horrified at what was happening, but was pleased with how it ended.

“It came out to pay off for us,” he said.

Taylor ended the game with four catches for 84 yards and the team’s only score and had 10 tackles and forced and recovered a fumble on defense. Young said Taylor’s heroics and his team’s defense won them the game.

“It came down to the wire and getting defensive stops, and I think our defense came to play,” he said. “Special teams played great. Offensively we had a rough night, but defense won the game for us and special teams flipped the field for us.”

Taylor had one of the team’s two forced fumbles, and Jamarious Little provided a red-zone interception late in the fourth quarter to kill an important drive for the Chargers.

“That was a big play,” Young said.

The win moved the Tigers to 5-3 overall and 1-1 in Region 4-3A play. Young said it was a “big key win” for his team.

“It just gets us back to playing good football,” he said. “We needed a key victory somewhere and we finally got one, especially on the road. I think this will spark us to finish our district strong and start our playoff run.”

Up next for Noxubee is a region game hosting Nettleton on Friday.

Pontotoc 26, Caledonia 13

Cavalier quarterback Cohen Clark scored two touchdown runs, but it was all Caledonia could muster offensively against a tough visiting Pontotoc defense Thursday in the team’s sixth loss of the year.

The Warriors took a 3-0 lead to halftime and pulled away 9-6 heading into the fourth quarter where it outscored Caledonia 17-7.

“I thought our kids played with great relentless effort and gave ourselves an opportunity at times to compete and get after it,” head coach Michael Kelly said. “I was really pleased with our defense in their effort on some of the plays they were able to make. … We played extremely hard offensively, I just don’t think we executed very well at times. I don’t think it was one position, I think it was a culmination of all of it. You hate to say this, but we played pretty consistently all year and then we just hit a lull in this past game.”

“I thought our energy was there. Our kids played extremely, extremely hard, you know, bodies flying around. It’s just probably five or six plays I wish we could go back and do different on both sides of the ball.”

The Cavs fell to 1-6 overall and 1-1 in region games with the loss and will host West Point on Friday.