Northeast looks to continue hot start with trip to Goodman

Northeast Mississippi Community College takes its league-leading defense into Goodman Thursday night as the Tigers look to continue the program’s best start since 2005.
 
Northeast (2-1, 1-0 in North Division) makes the trek to Goodman to take on Holmes Community College in the two program’s 46th meeting in the 51-year history of the Tiger football program.
 
Holmes enters Thursday’s contest winless on the year sporting an 0-3 record and an 0-1 mark in the division after falling to Coahoma 41-14 on the opening night of league play last week.
 
Northeast, on the other hand, continued its hot start by knocking off Mississippi Delta 26-13 in front of a packed Tiger Stadium in Booneville.
 
Leading the way for the Tigers is quarterback Clint Wilson (Olive Branch) who has thrown for 582 yards on the young season. Wilson has connected on 48-of-98 attempts on the year and accounted for four scores through the air.
 
While defenses have to contend with Wilson through the air, Jaquise Cook (Ripley) and Jamarcus Goodloe (Leighton, Ala.) have provided the thunder and lightning combination for the Tiger ground attack.
 
Cook leads the Tigers in rushing with 205 yards – 144 coming against the Trojans last week – while Goodloe has rumbled his way to 104 yards but is the Tigers leading scorer with four touchdowns on the season – including a pair against Mississippi Delta.
 
Northeast’s top-ranked defense is led by Anthony Brown (Cairo, Ga.), Trey Pegues (Oxford), Brynden Trawick (Atlanta, Ga.), Pat Moore (Southaven) and Anthony Payne (Leroy, Ala.) who combined have come up with an even 100 stops for the Tigers in three games.
 
The Anthonys – Payne and Brown – have been a force to reckon with for the Tigers on the defensive side of the ball. Payne leads the Tigers with five tackles-for-loss while Brown is tied with Carlos Warren (Hernando) for the team lead in forced fumbles.
 
Pegues and Moore top the team with a combined 3.5 quarterback sacks accounting for 32 lost yards by the opposition.
 
Holmes counters with running back Harry Peoples, who has scored four times in the Bulldogs’ opening trio of games. People also serves as Holmes’ punt returner and has an 86-yard score via the punt return on his early season resume.
 
On the defensive side of the ball, Northeast’s offense has to contend with linebackers Dennis Drew and Revel Graham.
 
Graham leads the Bulldogs with 22 solo stops on the season while Drew was named one of the defensive players of the week for the Mississippi Association of Community and Junior Colleges (MACJC)/Region XXIII for week one after Drew came up with 15 tackles, four tackles for loss and one sack against Southwest in the Bulldogs 21-20 loss to the Bears.
 
Northeast’s defense looks to keep its ranking as Holmes brings the worst offense in the state into Thursday’s affair. The Bulldogs are averaging just over 160 yards a game on offense while compiling a balanced attack of 235 yards on the ground and 255 through the air in three games.
 
Northeast’s pass defense is where the Tigers make their stand by allowing opponents only 94 yards a game through the air. Northeast has allowed only one score through the air in three games while limiting opponents to just 283 yards.
 
Northeast, which is off to its best start since the Tigers completed the regular season undefeated in 2005, look to break the pattern against Holmes. In the last four meetings, Northeast and Holmes have swapped victories with the Tigers taking a 25-10 win during the 2009 campaign.
 
Since 2005, Northeast holds a 3-2 mark against the Bulldogs but the series over the last decade is tied at 5-5. Holmes owns the series record at 26-18-1 with the only tie coming via a 7-7 decision in 1987.

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