FAYETTE — Jefferson County football coach James Herrington knows that a flawless game from his team won’t be enough to beat No. 1 ranked Tylertown on Friday. The Tigers will have to be better than that.

“The guys are going to have to put out extra effort,” Herrington said. “We can’t beat them with just a regular game. We’re going to have to play more than flawless football.”

The reason for Herrington’s concern is because Tylertown brings a perfect record into Friday’s game, including victories over a Class 5A and Class 6A school this season.

After surviving two consecutive one-point games early in the season, the Chiefs have won their last four games by an average of 28 points.

And the Chiefs defeated South Pike, a team that handily defeated Jefferson County earlier this season, 41-6 four weeks ago.

“Tylertown may be even better this year than they have been in the past,” Herrington said. “It’s going to be a tough game. It’s basically going to come down to our guys making hustle plays. If we’re able to win this game, which I believe we can, it will definitely come down to hustle plays.”

After losing three straight games, Jefferson County has recovered to win its last two contests over Amite County and Wilkinson County.

The Tigers now sit at 2-0 in Region 7-3A, which put them in good shape for the playoffs.

“Winning district games is always a good thing,” Herrington said. “After winning those two games, it pretty much puts us in the playoffs. Right now, we’re playing for position.”

And after getting off to such a great start in region play, Herrington said his team can relax and play loose against the rest of the region opponents.

“It’s definitely a sigh of relief,” Herrington said. “Maybe we can relax and go play some good football, do the things we’ve done the past two weeks. I’ve seen the team improve greatly over the last couple of weeks.”

Herrington said a key to upsetting Tylertown Friday night will be limiting turnovers and forcing turnovers by the Chiefs, which is what the Tigers have excelled in the last two weeks.

“We’ve played in some pretty tough weather so far and it looks like the same thing for this Friday,” Herrington said. “The most important thing will be ball security. We’ve been able to do that recently. We’ve had only one turnover in our last two games while the other team has turned it over quite a bit.”

Herrington admits that the Chiefs don’t have many weaknesses.

“Tylertown is a very fast team in all three phases of the game,” Herrington said. “They’re a well-coached, disciplined club. But everybody has a weakness, and hopefully we can find theirs.”