Merlin

I forgot George county was region 3. They would drop to region 4 before Hattiesburg.

For them to drop, 2 times have to go to 7A. Most likely would be 2 of either south panola, Warren central, Hancock or Grenada. Which if it plays out would send meridian and pearl to north state most likely. If Hancock moves up then Hattiesburg moves back to region 4 and that opens slot for most likely pearl to be in region 3.

They sure talked a lot of noise till bout week 3 last year.

I am pretty positive yall had at least 1 lineman in those years. I know one was committed to Usm but the signed elsewhere.

May need to schedule a bad 2A school.

West Jones won 2 with a bunch of juco kids on the rosters. 1 kid in the ‘20 team went straight d1 (Usm) after his high school career was over.

Yes. However a decent portion of the athletes are actually not originally from Laurel. And a number of them as well as done from within Laurel now are trying to get out.

Yep. They have had some internal struggles themselves going back Todd Breland leaving (there are reasons why he left and went to South jones) that have gotten “fiesty” the last few years. Some of it relating to their own recruiting efforts. Some volunteer coaches that think they better than paid coaches (the phrase “too many chiefs not enough Indians” is a good description). They lost 3 long time assistants including the guy doing most of the recruiting and the head coach was said to have interviewed for several other head coach openings, so obviously he may also see the writing on the wall. At least half the returning starters are wanting to transfer to other schools and this comes direct from one of them. But still their district do bad the can get into the playoffs with 2 wins and then who knows.

Yeah laurels collapse will need its own thread. The last 3 years was only the beginning. The weakness of 5A south as a whole has “helped” mask the reality of the situation as they only have to win 2 district games then 2 playoff games to make it look like they are ok. But they really aren’t. If not for the creation of 7A and the resulting split off of Hattiesburg, west jones, picayune. Etc etc into 6A Laurel would have had at most 3 wins and no playoff trips since 2022. Keep in mind since ‘22 they made a run to state in ‘23 and south state last year.

Funny thing here is there have been a couple from Laurel playing for Hattiesburg the last few years. If anyone wants to actually win a title then Laurel under current leadership is not going to get it done.

Yes, but at the same time, no. Now that college recruits get NIL the colleges are offering more money to kids that stand out in larger classifications, on average. There are kids being told directly that they can get 50k a year as is but if they go up a couple school classes and perform the same they can get 75k. That drives a lot of the transfers. There are pending lawsuits in several states now where school athletics governing bodies denied transfers from kids we were told this. Then lawsuits were filed arguing that former coach/school and state athletics body had impeded the kids right to future income. This involves federal income laws. This is precisely why some states are allowing high school nil and school choice laws to pass. MS is too far behind. Or too many people in state legislature and/or the MHSAA are trying to find a plan to have it pass so that they themselves profit off of it first. I’m waiting ti see when the first lawsuit hits and what dominoes fall after that.

I’m sure every single 7A school trying to do so. Tupelo, Starkville, Oxford, Madison central, Clinton, Brandon, petal, oak grove, Gulfport, ocean springs are all big time recruiting from the text groups I have seen. Some schools hide it well, some are blatant and basically dare MHSAA to try to stop it. It will take state legislature passing laws to stop or allow it. MHSAA only cares if it affects their money or if the right person complains. There will eventually be some lawsuits popping up over it. You can about bet on it.

Hattiesburg going after any kid that has any family in Hattiesburg they could live with or use address of. Statewide at that. Other coaches starting to complain. They better stay out of the jackson area 7A schools. Trying to pull to many from there they will get mhsaa on ya.

Taylorsvilles downfall may have been somewhat orchestrated from within its own district.

Laurel been using their youth league the same way to get kids from jones, Wayne and jasper counties. Laurels most recent big 3 o linemen that went to the sec all should have been at west jones. One of their wr’s should have been northeast jones. Couple d linemen from Wayne county. Actually laurels d line/strength coach was their big “recruiter” and he just left them for Wayne county. Corey Reynolds now on Laurel staff as o line coach. Also rumors they hired jack hankins. Kids are trying to bail on Laurel now. As I said earlier, most of the kids are invtext and chat groups with each other. I have seen screen shots of the conversations. They do talk to each other and try to te riot each other. As soon as one finds out they have relatives in the other district whims address they can use its game on. Laurel kids know the stuff that happened behind the scenes at WJ at they are trying to get out of they can. Kids trying to get out of northeast jones as well. I know at least 2 Hattiesburg was after from o saw in the screenshots. A few other specific cases I know of as well. The kids recruit each other more than coaches do

Out of those 27 schools I bet there’s 20 different districts. Cutting that by half or 2/3 would for sure save the state some payroll funds.

Tupelo was already recruiting. I have a cousin that was recruited by every school you just named. Actually Biggersville is one of the smaller school the MHSAA refused to touch despite ample evidence by several other schools admin of what they were doing. I was told up front that there was an alumnus family with money that had ties to mhsaa that kept them at bay. Actually Tupelo is one of the ones the mhsaa would target to make statement to others. Big enough it would be noticed, but not the history or pedigree of other programs. Now that they have had success a couple years if it strings out a bit they could enter that “don’t mess with them too much” status. Same with Gulfport.

MHSAA is as corrupt as it gets. They only enforce rules sometimes against some schools that they target to make examples of, and refuse to target certain others. Also all depends on who a given coach/school/rich fan has pull with on the council.

I know. I’m just giving yall a hard time in this slow season. There’s another from NW rankin that’s a basketball player also that yall trying to get. A lot of kids all over the state go to various camps and get in text/message groups either each other through various apps and such. And some are actively using this to convince others to come join them x team and what not. Particularly if one of the other kids have family in an area. Some coaches get them as well. This is also partly why some kids parade they are moving on social media like the college kids do. MHSAA is aware and won’t or can’t do anything about it unless a coach complains. And even then MHSAA is limited. Most coaches do not want to hold kids back that do not want to play for them. Only coaches who are butthurt at the kid or the school they are going too will say anything. And in almost every case if kids parents or school district take things to court against mhsaa if they stop a kid then judge almost always rules against mhsaa as they have no legal authority. This is why many trying to get senate to pass laws and possibly reformat the mhsaa.

Looks like Hattiesburg’s poor performance at WR in the spring game convinced them to go recruit some wr’s to transfer in. 6’3 kid from fcahs and a kid from Brandon

Other than 1 guy on each o and d line, Hattiesburg’s lines looked…………(thinking of a descriptive word)…..,,…lesser, than they have in a few years. Heidelbergs lines handled them. The d backfield also looked very vulnerable.

I’m convinced the only reason Heidelberg didn’t win 2A last year was Carter had checked out and was focusing on trying to find a job elsewhere.

That’s what happens when a proud program has spent some time being strangled then makes a change. WJ, which had over 80 kids returning for football anyway has well over 100 come out after the kids returned from Christmas break. I had heard it was about 130. And jr high team has over 70. One thing that had been kept kind of quiet was how many had left the team or didn’t move up after jr high due the actions of the former hc. WJ was going to have proportionately smaller number of juniors this next season than it would seniors or sophomores for this reason.