Ferriday begins district play

By Jeff Edwards (Contact) | The Natchez Democrat

Published Thursday, October 8, 2009

FERRIDAY — The Ferriday Trojans have played a difficult pre-district schedule to get them ready for when the District 2-2A season starts.

Well, that season is now here and Trojans coach Freddie Harrison believes his team is ready to battle in the tough district.

“We made the schedule so that it would benefit us in the long run and get us ready for district play,” Harrison said. “Hopefully we fine-tuned everything we needed to fine-tune and have got everything rolling.”

Of its five non-district games, four of them were against teams in larger classifications, including two Class 4A schools and a Mississippi Class 6A school.

The Trojans went 4-1 in pre-district play, with its only loss coming by six points to Class 6A Natchez High.

Harrison said those games were needed to prepare his team for a very tough district.

“I think this is one of the toughest leagues in Louisiana,” Harrison said. “I call it the baby SEC.”

And first up for the Trojans in the baby SEC is the Manham Dragons, who have an identical 4-1 record.

Mangham lost its first game of the season to Ouachita Christian, but has won its past four games, including a 30-23 victory over Block last Friday.

The Dragons are playing their first season in Class 2A after moving up from Class 1A after last season.

“Mangham is a real good, athletic team,” Harrison said. “They are real disciplined and play sound football. They are well-coached. Coach (Tommy) Tharp has got them going.”

Harrison said the strength of Mangham’s team is its defense, which is also the strength of the Trojans.

Because of that, Harrison said he expects a low-scoring game.

“Defensively they’re a really fast football team,” Harrison said. “They’ve got a lot of athletes. We’ve got to go out there and play sound, fundamental football. I think it will be a real hard-fought football teams.”

And in most tight games, the difference is turnovers. And Harrison said Ferriday must win the turnover battle if it wants to start district play at 1-0.

“This game will be decided by turnovers,” Harrison said. “Whoever creates more turnovers will be the team that prevails.”