HAMPTON — The Greyhounds coaching staff ran into a good problem to have on Sunday.
After posting a shutout of Hampton on Friday night, Jones County coaches searched at multiple places in town to find enough doughnuts to have on hand for players making their way to the building for Sunday workouts.
The reason? Celebrating giving up zero points the Friday night before, a 27-0 road win against a Hampton team that the week before had beaten Stockbridge 28-27.
Now, after three weeks of traveling a combined 310 miles, the Greyhounds will be back at home Friday to face Ola, having blanked the Hornets a week after losing to Woodland.
“We were upset after the loss. We took it, tried to learn from it, grow, and make sure our guys knew how to grow from a loss. It really led to a focused week of practice,” Greyhounds head coach Justin Montgomery said. “Now, the goal is to take a win and see if we can learn from a win and have a good week of practice.”
The matchup against the Mustangs carries enough fire in itself given that the two teams have split their last four meetings with just one game being decided by more than seven points. Add in the fact that eight teams in the region have a 1-1 record so far, and there will be more than plenty on the line Friday with the Mustangs in town. Ola is 2-1, having lost 21-6 to Locust Grove and topping ELCA 49-7 last week.
A win by Jones County on Friday would enable it to keep pace among the region’s leaders while a loss could throw the Greyhounds into an uphill battle a third of the way through the region schedule.
“You want to go 1-0 and focus on us. It’s hard when you have a game like this,” Montgomery said. “It takes discipline, and the focus has to be on us. You have to stick to your process and keep your eyes focused. To go 1-0 each week, that is the goal.”
Speaking of each game having a life of its own, the Greyhounds put the disappointment of the previous week’s 20-16 loss to Woodland behind them on Friday. Part of that came on the ground.
A week after rushing for less than 80 yards, Jones County’s offensive line reversed course, opening holes as the game went on and imposing their will during the second half, wearing the Hornets down.
“We challenged them.
We weren’t happy with last week’s results. We challenged them to take the process seriously and do the little things that it takes to win the game,” Greyhounds offensive line coach Will Patterson said.
“We had 72 yards rushing last week. We challenged the O-line each day of practice and put them through a lot. They answered the call, I’m proud of them, especially with the second half.”
The Greyhounds were able to get both of their primary backs going on Friday with Travis Miller and Bruno Hicks having 16 carries. Hicks rushed for 121 yards with Miller racking up 101. After the Greyhounds took a quick 3-0 lead on a Jacob Watts field goal off of a recovered squib kick to open the game, Hicks extended the JCHS lead in the second quarter. After a pass from quarterback Cason Taylor to Drew Williams got the Greyhounds in the red zone, runs of 11 and 4 yards by Hicks made it a 10-0 Jones County lead.
Hicks blew the game open to begin the third quarter, going 45 yards down the sideline on a 45-yard touchdown run, moving the JCHS lead to 17-0.
“Bruno and Travis both had big nights. Those guys ran really well and really hard,” Montgomery said. “Both of them had some really good plays for us, I was just proud of he way that they went about business.”
Hicks’ backbreaking touchdown run turned out to be plenty of cushion for the Greyhounds on defense, a unit that didn’t allow a drive by Hampton inside the JCHS 20-yard line as they prevented the Hornets from converting a high number of completed passes downfield thanks to the Greyhounds defensive secondary being up to task all night long.
Junior Holloway was one of them, returning an interception inside the Hampton 25-yard line in the fourth quarter, setting up a five-yard touchdown power run by backup quarterback Travis Brock for the final 27-0 margin.
Ninth-grade Hounds beat Warner Robins The future of Jones County football shined last week with the Greyhounds defeating Warner Robins 38-33 in ninthgrade football action.
Jones County’s ninth grade plays Thursday at Lee County with JCHS hosting the JV game.
