PRAIRIE VIEW, Texas — There is a thin line between a gut-wrenching loss and the exhilaration of victory, and it was written on the faces of the Southern players, coaches and support personnel following Saturday’s 31-24 overtime victory.
To put it into a pithy statement, “Wow, did that just really happen?”
Battling from behind all night, Southern’s resilience won out in the 31-24 overtime victory. An offense that sputtered all night scored on the first overtime play, a 25-yard run by Kendric Rhymes.
Then the Jaguars defense took the “bend but don’t break” cliché to the max. Prairie View looked primed to tie the game with a first-and-goal at the Southern 1, then went backward on four consecutive plays with an offensive pass interference penalty helping greatly.
“Our guys showed a lot of mettle, a lot of moxie,” Southern coach Terrence Graves said. “It’s hard to keep a team out of the end zone that close. A lot of good things have got to happen. Our guys stepped up to the plate and made it happen.”
On first down, Elijah West and Herman Brister combined to drop Lamagea McDowell for a 2-yard loss. On the next play, another 2-yard loss courtesy of Josh Tate and Zak Yassine.
Jamarius Brown dropped a potential game-ending interception on third down, but PVU was called for offensive pass interference. Southern accepted the penalty which put the ball at the 20 but gave the Panthers two plays to tie. Defensive end Jelani Davis took care of that with sacks of quarterback Cam Peters on the next two plays to finish it off.
“It’s not easy, you’ve got to work,” Davis said. “I’ve never been in a goal line stand like that before,” Davis said. “But it’s what I’m supposed to do: dominate.”
Said linebacker Derrick Williams: “We knew we were going to get a stop. Not one of us batted an eye.”
Southern finished with six sacks. Davis and Williams had seven tackles each. Brister led the way with 11 and Jamarlo Campbell nine. But the unit left a few plays on the field, dropping at least three interception chances and blowing a coverage on a 72-yard touchdown pass by the Panthers.
While Graves said quarterback Noah Bodden “grew up” in this game, so did the Jaguars offensive line. It helped to break a huge 28-yard run by Kobe Dillon to set up the tying touchdown and put Southern ahead for the first time since the first quarter on a 25-yard touchdown run by Rhymes in overtime.
Southern had 29 yards rushing in the first half and 162 afterward.
“Those offensive linemen took it personal,” Graves said. “They put it on their shoulders and started knocking people off the ball. We’re going to stay with it (running game). Those guys stayed with it, and it paid off for us.”
The best part for the Jaguars is they can savor the victory through the off week with the next SWAC game three weeks away.
“This game talks about the team we have,” Graves said. “We’ve got a good football team. Last week was last week. We met the guys, we talked, corrected the things we needed to correct. Those guys came out and practiced with a sense of purpose and urgency all week long. They took the coaching. We made some adjustments and changes. The guys answered the bell.
“We’re going to go back and do some self-scouting to see what we do well and don’t do well. We’re going to start working on us and toward the end of the week on Nicholls State.”