All five area football teams got their final tune-ups before the football season kicks off this Friday night.
On Friday, three of those teams played at East Central Community College. Union started the jamboree with a 27-15 loss to Northeast Lauderdale. Then Newton County kicked off the Bobby Bass era with a 7-0 win over Lake.
On Thursday night, Newton County Academy played in the Tri-County Academy jamboree, falling 7-0 to Central Holmes and 21-0 to Central Hinds.
Newton ended the week on Saturday as they fell 27-0 to three-time defending 1A champion Hollandale Simmons and 20-6 to Class 4A Leake Central.
Newton County
The Cougars started off the Bobby Bass era with a surprising 7-0 win over Lake at East Central.
For Bass, it was good to see where his team was at after a long summer.
“It was good to see where we are,” Bass said. “It’s been a long journey from spring football to summer weights. I guess we are trying to develop that mental toughness where when something bad happens, we don’t hang our heads. That’s probably the best thing we got out of it. We had some things that weren’t going right and then we made some big plays.”
The Cougars scored its one touchdown on a touchdown pass from Ethan West to Rod Davis, who pulled in a nice one-handed grab behind the Lake defense for the score.
The win was a big confidence boast for the Cougars, who were 1-9 last year.
“When you go from where they were last year, we needed the confidence,” Bass said. “They needed to see some results from their hard work and these guys have worked hard. They have done everything I have asked them to do. That hard work is paying off.”
The Cougars will open the regular season by hosting Leake Central on Friday. Leake Central won last year’s game 34-14.
“We know they are going to be athletic,” Bass said. “They have a new head coach and he comes from Louisville and I’m sure they are going to be well coached.”
