longhorn75

A big money yet big expectations job. I’m curious to see with Joey Hawkins at Columbia Academy, now and him bringing in a truly all star coaching staff, where Columbia goes. This has to be a slam dunk hire for them bc Hawkins is now in town.

I am curious if they move Tommy Ferrill back to offensive coordinator.

Wow. JA hires former Kent State DC Dave Duggan as their new head coach... He was their defensive coordinator in 2022. I have no doubt as his being an excellent defensive coach, however this hire is likely not suited well for the inherent issues at JA right now. I would've liked to see an MAIS vet, but wish him the best.

I had seen that there was a petition to keep Coach Plummer at Richland.

I respectfully disagree on the football and baseball culture shift. Football has always been a huge deal for Jackson Academy, especially with the coaches they had 20 or so years, ago. They were a perennial powerhouse when Hawkins and Sykes were there, and with Coach Blount and Shaw were very stinking good. Same with Coach Powell when he coached baseball there. Aside from the obvious migrations from the Jackson area especially the Ridgewood side, I think you can attribute the successes of other athletic programs to JA's success on the gridiron. Hawkins was able to develop his outstanding skill players because he had such a rock solid boy's track program, a strategy that contributed to his success at PCS as well. I do agree that they need a young coach who can compete and knows the tools of success that we have seen out of Davis and MRA, and even the resurgence of Jackson Prep with Goodwin. I cannot emphasize this enough though, the new coach HAS TO KNOW THE MAIS. This has been an issue with a lot of these MAIS teams that hire these out of association coaches who struggle with the program. There are exceptions like Black, Barnes, and Goodwin, but yeah.

Agreed. All their success came from seasoned MAIS coaches. Maybe they can go hire a young coach, like Land from Lamar or another MAIS vet. To give Pogue credit, he was a good coach for JA. As head coach, he got them to the championship game his first season. I think but for the big Raider upheaval, he would still have had that team playing competitively.

Where did Blackwell go? Back to Alabama? honestly the past several years have been very weird for what we were accustomed to from JA. They’ve gone through four football coaches in ten years. I get it’s part of the business, but the turnover there is insane from a school that never really switched coaches much before this . .

I do contend that this year's MRA team was very young at receiver, and aside from John White, they were decent at best. I think they have the coaching to get there. Just all about how talent with them, and more importantly around them, is. Hartfield, and JA have had to recruit heavy duty to supplant MRA's efforts there.

Joey Hawkins is a home run hire here. The man can win. I'm surprised he wasn't asked to coach track as well, considering his reputation as a track master.

I'll never understand why Long Beach got rid of Forrest Williams and moved him to administration. He had turned the corner by the end of it.

Yeah, Lamar is basically MRA lite. Lamar's head coach played for Davis in high school, and then was his OC one year. Lamar's defensive coordinator, is Davis's son. Lamar runs basically MRA's offense. Also, more kids in the Madison area. MRA would win that one big.

JA beat Bayou Academy 27-8. Bayou was in it the whole game, but could not capitalize on red zone trips at all.

Prayers sent. May the Almighty bestow his healing hand on Coach Davis. The several people I know that know him talk about how great of a man he is, and the impact that he has on young people's lives.

Yes I remember when MRA got hit with sanctions in 94, the baseball team was in the playoffs when the announcement came and they were ruled ineligible and had to forfeit. I am curious who the other 14 violations are, if they are.

Actually no. I can think of several private school kids that have been Dandy Dozen. Overstreet, Buchanan at Prep, and then Saahdiq Charles at MRA, I believe.

The odds of Hartfield getting this overturned are about as slim as Twiggy. I can't see any reason how they could spin the video evidence.

Possibly John White at MRA. He's been fabulous for academy ball.

The MAIS wants quality athletes from public schools. They just want to share the wealth. Looks like the St. Joe coach pled his case. Ironic though that St. Joe ratted em out, cause of the stories of them recruiting out there. Looks like it'll be Prep and MRA in Mississippi College this year.

I don't have an issue at all, with a coach getting his PERS years in, and then double-dipping. You cannot fault a coach for doing what's best for his family and himself. He gets full-retirement, and some spending cash on top of that,. Anyway, it's not like teachers get paid much at all, so you can't fault them for double dipping. We have actually had some retired public school coaches who have taken their school to the championship, Ricky Black, of course dominated at Prep, and Doug Goodwin has done the same in his legacy. Mangum took Wayne and Simpson to the State title game, but came up short both times. Look at the decline of St. Andrew's after David Bradberry stepped away from there. Regardless though, after you retire many people work to keep themselves active, and to find a pastime. Life after retirement can be very boring at times, and thus you can't fault a person to work a post-retirement career to supplement their incomes, and to keep themselves proficient.

Heritage hired Tobias Smith as their new head coach.

In the MAIS, it's not even close how good Jackson Prep's staff is. Most of those assistants have been there forever.

I am curious to see Prep and West Jones, and to see how well MRA can compete with Oak Grove. Oak Grove will likely win.

This explains a lot. Guessing he was standing on the sidelines?

Only place I can think of is either JA or Hartfield in the Metro. Hartfield did wonders with the kid they had last year. and JA was a sneaky good team.

Wow. so, they are going to be the punching bag of the metro 6A, I guess. Right I found it odd that the coach and his wife were all over twitter talking about this. Now, with Hartfield picking up that star player that St. Joe is upset that they picked up, I am not surprised. Hartfield is trying hard to get up to the higher echelon, especially with Prep making a huge resurgence once they got the right coach in Goodwin.