Mt. Tabor bounces back
Photo by by Alphonso Abbott Jr.- Josiah Crosby, No. 11 in gold, jumps on the fumble.
Two weeks ago Mt. Tabor took a drubbing 42-13 at the hands of East Forsyth. Spartan head coach Mike Lovelace said he knew his young players would respond well in their next game. His team did just that as they defeated West Forsyth by the score of 13-0.
In 2016, the matchup between the Titans and the Spartans was the most highly anticipated game of the year. That game went down to the final seconds where Mt. Tabor scooped up a fumble and ran it all the way back for the winning score.
West Forsyth, coming off a decisive victory against the Carver Yellowjackets, looked to keep the momentum going against the Spartans, but the Spartans had other ideas. Two touchdowns that were called back because of penalties really hurt the Titans’ efforts.
Jared Eure, West Forsyth head coach, said based off of the success they enjoyed last season and the big win in Week One, spirits were high heading into the Mt. Tabor game. He says he knows Mt. Tabor routinely keeps a pretty good JV team, so he knew anything could happen.
“Our expectations are to go undefeated every year but after last week, that can’t happen, so now we have to try and look to go 9-1 and finish the season strong,” said Eure. “Our expectations are always high for our kids.”
Historically, the games between the two schools have been well played on both sides because of the enormous level of talent on both sidelines. For Eure, he says even though he knew the Spartans fell to East Forsyth last week, they could not overlook them.
“Mt. Tabor is always good and they are always well coached,” Eure went on to say. “It’s always a tough game like last year when it came down to a fumble that they ran back for a touchdown, which led to them being 10-0 and us being 9-1.”
“You can’t look at how bad they got beat the week before because we don’t know what happened in that game. We can only judge how they play against us because it’s a rivalry game, so we throw the records out the window.”
Following the loss to the Eagles the week before, Lovelace said his young players needed to make sure they stick with their defensive assignments and the rest will fall into place. Against the Titans the difference from the week prior was night and day.
Lovelace lost many of his skilled position players from the undefeated 2016 team. He says integrating the new players into his system would take some time so they would lean on the defense to carry the load until the offense comes around.
Defensively Eure feels as though his team played well. It was a 0-0 game midway through the third quarter until a blown coverage by the Titans allowed Mt. Tabor to get on the board first. In the fourth West Forsyth was mounting a good drive but was halted by a fumble.
“Their defense played really well and they kicked our butt honestly,” Eure continued. “They deserved to win and we did not play well. They played better than we did, and that’s just JV football.”
For Eure he says the difficult part is getting the kids to focus mentally because the physical part is easy. He says the young guys have to understand that everyone wants to beat them because of their history of success.
Eure had high praise for Caleb Bolen and James Gordon for their play Wednesday night. Bolen had an interception and Gordon had a punt return for a touchdown that was called back. Eure called Gordon a leader on the team and says he will be looked upon to play a more prominent role on the offensive end going forward.
