Tuesday, November 1, 2005
PRCC preps for post-season playoffs with ‘Katrina delayed’ Co-Lin battle this Thursday to wrap regular season
Defending state champs enter rescheduled road battle off 40-0 shutout of East Miss; Wolves 1-1 following 45-14 blowout road loss at Northeast

    POPLARVILLE — Defending national and state football champ Pearl River and South Division rival Copiah-Lincoln will do battle for the 70th time Thursday when the playoff-bound Wildcats host the Wolves at 7 p.m. in Dobie Holden Stadium to wrap up the 2005 regular season.
    The game was originally scheduled for Sept. 15, but was moved to the tailend of the regular season due to the aftermath Hurricane Katrina wreaked on south Mississippi.
The Wildcats saw their hopes of a ‘three-peat” as MACJC South champions last Thursday when Mississippi Gulf Coast waxed division foe Hinds 26-10 in Raymond to clinch its first division title and iced its first playoff appearance in nearly two decades. Pearl River, which picked up its first loss in 23 outings Oct. 20 with a 55-47 defeat to MGCCC in Perkinston and plummeted from second to 10th in the NJCAA poll, bombed non-division rival Mississippi Delta 51-14 last week in Poplarville.
    Pearl River (5-1 overall, 4-1 division) has already secured a post-season playoff berth with the No. 2 spot in the South and will take on undefeated and third-ranked North Division champ Northeast Mississippi on the road in the first-round of the MACJC playoffs Saturday, Nov. 12 in Booneville; while Gulf Coast will host North No. 2 Itawamba on the same day in Perkinston.
    On the other hand, Co-Lin (1-5, 1-4) has suffered misfortune in 2005. After opening the delayed season with a 16-6 road victory over Northwest Mississippi, the Wolves have since dropped five straight; including last week’s 36-19 decision to arch-rival Southwest Mississippi.
    Defensively, the Wolves have given up only 129 points in six games — only three more points than the nationally-ranked Wildcats — but it’s the offensive side that has spelled Coach Glenn Davis’ team’s doom. Co-Lin has managed a meager 12 touchdowns (eight pass, four rush) thus far with an offense that is averaging an even 300 yards (163.7 rush, 136.3 pass) a game.
    Conversely, Pearl River leads the state and nation in total offense, averaging a whopping 514.3 yards (334.3 pass, 180.2 rush) a game and has scored 33 TDs behind rocket armed All-American quarterback Jimmy Oliver. Oliver, 2004's NJCAA and Region 23 “Offensive Player of the Year,” also leads the state and nation in passing offense and individual total offense with 1,973 through the air with an additional 242 on the ground (2,215 total).
    Fourth-year PRCC head coach Tim Hatten says the Wildcats anxious to wrap up the regular season, but must remained focused on the game at hand.
    “We’ve got to take them one game at a time,” he said. “We’ve sewed up a playoff spot, but this game is still an important one for us...particularly as far as the national picture is concerned.
    “We’ve still got an outside chance of getting back into the national championship game if we take care of our business,” Hatten explained. “Defensively, we’ve got to play better if we’re going to go anywhere in the post-season. We’ve got to get back to that aggressive, swarming defense we had back in the first couple of games of the season and stop giving up big plays.”
    Last week’s national results threw a big kink into the NJCAA poll. Last Sunday, No. 1-ranked and previously-undefeated Butler (Kan.) CC, which PRCC defeated 35-14 last November in the Dalton Defenders Bowl for the national title, fell to Dodge City (Kan.) CC 23-17 in the semi-final round of the Jayhawk Conference playoffs; leaving only three undefeated teams — Arizona’s No. 2 Glendale (7-0), Mississippi’s No. 3 Northeast (5-0), and Minnesota West (8-0) — in the national Top 10.
    Four other top-ranked teams other than Pearl River sport only one loss, including Michigan’s No. 4 Grand Rapids (7-1), Utah’s No. 8 Snow (7-1), and New York’s No. 9 Nassau (7-1). No. 6 Northeast Oklahoma (6-2) has two losses, while Kansas’ No. 7 Garden City picked up its third loss of the year with a 40-26 loss to Coffeyville (Kan.) In the Jayhawk Conference playoffs. No. 11-ranked and South champ Mississippi Gulf Coast (5-1) also has only one less thus far and closes out the regular season against non-division foe Holmes Thursday.
    Last year’s match up against the Wolves in Wesson saw the Wildcats struggled early and witness the Wolves carry a 7-7 stalemate into the lockerroom at the intermission, then go up 14-7 early in the third quarter before PRCC bounced back with 28 unanswered points to take a 35-14 decision for its first division win of the season.     Pearl River finished the sunny Homecoming afternoon with 384 yards of total offense (304 pass, 80 rush) to Co-Lin’s 138 (100 pass, 38 rush).
 

The PRCC-Co-Lin Rivalry...
    The Pearl River-Copiah-Lincoln rivalry dates back to 1934 when the Wolves took a 12-0 shutout over the Wildcats. With the exception of 1936's 7-7 and 1941's 13-13 deadlocks, Pearl River wasn't victorious over Co-Lin until 1946's 32-7 win.
    Legendary PRCC head coach Dobie Holden led the Wildcats on a nine-year winning streak over the Wolves, starting in 1948 before Co-Lin snapped the string with a 20-14 victory in 1955, then won 14-13 in 1957. Pearl River pounded the Wolves 52-6 in 1961's state and national championship season, then took a 50-14 lopsided win two years later in another state title year for the River. After 1964's 42-0 shutout, the Wolves picked up a 15-7 and 21-19 victories in 1965 and 1966, respectively.
    John Russell succeeded Holden in 1967 and was 5-1-1 against the Wolves in his seven seasons at the Wildcat helm. Harvey Seligman was named interim head coach the 1974 season after Russell resigned during the preseason and recorded a 16-13 win over Co-Lin. J.C. Arban arrived on the scene in 1975 and reeled off a 6-5 mark in his 11 seasons with the Wildcats. Arban's successor, Mike Nelson, was 1-3 against the Wolves, while Willie Coats followed with a 2-3 mark.
    Keith Daniels succeeded Coats in 1995 and was 2-3 in five years. He died of a brain hemorrhage five games into the 2000 season.
    Pearl River leads the series with 36 wins compared to 31 losses and three ties and has won an unprecedented 17 state championships. Co-Lin has won nine titles, including a string of six straight from 1929 through 1934 and back-to-back championships in 1937 and 1938. The Wolves won their last championship in 1985, while PRCC has won back-to-back titles in 2003 and last year.
 

Elsewhere Around The MACJC Last Week
    In other South Division games around the league last week, Mississippi Gulf Coast (5-1, 5-1) clinched the South Division crown with a 26-10 win over Hinds (3-3, 2-3) in Raymond and East Central (3-3, 2-3) defeated Jones (2-4, 2-3) 28-14 in Ellisville. North match ups saw Coahoma (2-4, 2-3) defeat Holmes (2-4, 2-4) 26-21 in Goodman, division champ Northeast Mississippi (6-0, 5-0) spoil East Mississippi’s (2-4, 2-3) Homecoming 45-27 in Scooba, and playoff-bound Itawamba (5-1, 4-1) put a damper on Northwest Mississippi’s (1-5, 1-4) Homecoming celebration with a 29-21 setback.
 

This Week Around The MACJC...
    All final regular-season games will be played on Thursday, including Northeast Mississippi at Coahoma in Clarksdale, East Central at Southwest Mississippi in McComb, Itawamba at East Mississippi in Scooba, Hinds at Jones in Ellisville, Mississippi Gulf Coast at Holmes in Goodman, and Mississippi Delta at Northwest Mississippi in Senatobia.
 

Listen To The Wildcats
    All Pearl River games are broadcast live on WMXI-FM (98.1) in Hattiesburg, WFFF-FM (96.7) in Columbia, WBOX-FM (92.9) and WBOX-AM (920) in Bogalusa, La.; and WRJW-AM (1320) in Picayune. Long-time play-by-play announcer Jason Baker and color commentator Clay Sweet will handle the broadcast. Airtime for Thursday’s PRCC-MGCCC broadcast is 6:30 p.m. You may also listen to the Wildcats over the internet by logging on to www.prcc.edu. Click on the icon at the bottom left of the screen, and follow the instructions.